After having spoken to Ronda Rousey personally, UFC President Dana White has the feeling that her fighting career is over.
White gave his opinion on Rousey’s future during an interview on the ‘UFC Unfiltered’ podcast, though he did stress that nothing has been decided either way at this stage.
“In the conversation I had with her, if I had to say right here right now — and again, I don’t like saying right here right now because it’s up to her — but I wouldn’t say she fights again,” White told Jim Norton and Matt Serra. “I think she’s probably done. She’s going to ride off into the sunset and start living life outside of fighting.”
White said that Rousey was in good spirits when they spoke, but he feels that after two tough losses in a row she’s questioning whether this is really the path she wants to continue going down.
“Once she lost, she started to say to herself, ‘what the f*ck am I doing? This is my whole life — this is it? I want to experience and start doing other things.’ And I think that’s what she started to do, and she’s got a lot of money. She’s never going to need money again.
“Because, unless you spend money like Floyd [Mayweather], you’re not going to need money again when you have the kind of money Ronda has.”
If Rousey’s career is over then it’s going to be a massive blow to the UFC, given that she’s one of the two biggest stars in the sport alongside Conor McGregor, but White insists that he’ll support whatever she decides to do.
“I’m happy for her, man. She came in, she changed the world. She put female fighting on the map. She’s been part of the biggest fights in the history of women’s fighting, and I hope those records can be broken. I don’t know if they can, but I hope they can.”
