Cris “Cyborg” Justino and Holly Holm are clearly the most popular, charismatic and marketable female fighters on the roster.
UFC women’s featherweight champion Cris Cyborg will attempt to defend her title against former UFC women’s bantamweight champion Holly Holm at UFC 219 this Saturday, December 30th
The ever-destructive Cyborg is generally regarded as a sure-thing against most of her opponents; this is not the case leading up to this fight Holm. Holm’s coach Mike Winkeljohn even believes his student will shock the world by finishing Cyborg.
“Holly’s stopping Cris Cyborg probably later in the fight,” he said on a recent episode of Submission Radio. “You know, round four, round five she’s gonna finish the fight, shock the world again. [Holm isn’t being paid what she’s worth]. No, she deserves much more, but it is what it is. Cyborg’s got the title, Holly doesn’t have a title, so we don’t have all the chips at the moment, and the fight is what’s most important. Beating Cris Cyborg puts Holly back and higher where she will be the, I guess, biggest name ever in women’s combat sports. So she’s gotta win the fight and got to do that first, and then maybe she’ll get paid even more in the next one.”
Cyborg’s coach Parillo was recently speaking to MMAJunkie, feels that she has not gotten the chance to show how much of a draw she really is and she is at some other level. However, at the same time, they are not taking the fight any lightly.
“A lot of people know who Cris is,” Parillo said. “She’s a big draw as it is, but she’s a bigger draw than anybody even knows because we haven’t had her on this big promotion.”
“I believe (Cyborg) can go in there and dominate, and that’s what we expect. We also expect the worst,” Parillo said. “We’re training for how this fight can go any way.”
“Cris is just on another level than these girls. I really, truly believe she is. I know Holly has all the experience in the world and is very smart and an intelligent fighter, and they’re going to go in there with a hell of a game plan, but Cris is a different animal.”
Holm’s shocking knockout (KO) of Ronda Rousey at UFC 193 was backed by a reported 1.1 million pay-per-view buy rate.
The estimated PPV buy rate for Justino’s most recent action at UFC 214, where she scores the featherweight title against Tonya Evinger, was 850,000 buys. But Promotions didn’t officially release any numbers.
What do you think who will emerge victorious between two badass fighters at UFC 219?
