Julianna Pena is not impressed with Ronda Rousey.
Rousey — a former UFC women’s bantamweight champion and trail blazer for women’s MMA as a whole — recently returned to the WWE but would lose her Wrestlemania 38 match against Charlotte Flair this past weekend.
Pena — the currently 135-pound queen — was in attendance in Dallas to watch Wrestlemania and decided to take aim at Rousey in a recent interview just a few days later.
In particular, she believes Rousey’s legacy is affected particularly by how she departed the UFC on a two-fight losing streak.
“Ronda is so old news, right?” Pena said on The MMA Hour. “I think that what’s incredible about her is that she opened up the door and was destroying people in 10 seconds, and became a star because she was demolishing people in the first round, and that’s great — but she got knocked out twice and never came back. So how legit is she?
“She had to go to pro wrestling. And I get that and I think that that’s great. But as a fighter and somebody who is competitive, I know that — deep down — it probably truly bothers her, the fact that she went away off of two knockout losses and never came back to make her name good. If it really truly does bother her and if it gets under her skin at the end of the day to know that, you know, her legacy is kind of ruined by the fact that she never came back and never got back on the horse, then I would like to invite her to please come back — and if she would like to come back, I would welcome her with open arms.”
Julianna Pena Ready To Face ‘Joke’ Ronda Rousey
Rousey was a dominant force in women’s MMA until she suffered back-to-back knockout defeats to Holly Holm and Amanda Nunes.
“Rowdy” didn’t take either defeats well before she eventually retired from the UFC. While she will still go down as a legend, her legacy is certainly affected by her last two outings.
And for Pena, Rousey is a bit of a joke in the MMA world as things stand. However, she is still down to face her should Rousey decide to return.
“That’s what I’m saying, she’s kind of a joke in the MMA world now, because she’s a — what is the word? — sellout,” Pena added. “Like, a little bit of a sellout there. I mean, I guess I understand, right? It’s like, pro wrestling is fake, you get paid millions of dollars, I get it.
“But for me, for real s***, for like the ‘you’re the real, real deal,’ I would say that that’s in the UFC. And if she ever wants any of that real smoke, I’m ready.”
Perhaps Pena is planting the seeds for a lucrative matchup down the line?
