Julianna Peña almost crashed Amanda Nunes‘ party at UFC 289.
Last weekend, the two-time UFC women’s bantamweight champion decided to call it a career after defeating Irene Aldana. Of course, you might know how Nunes’ rival Peña took the news… not well. Peña was originally matched up with Nunes in the Canadian headliner but was forced out of the trilogy fight due to an injury.
‘Mystic Peña’
Peña was vastly disappointed with Nunes’ retirement announcement, but she was not surprised.
“First off, you need to call me mystic Peña cause I have special powers,” Peña said on The MMA Hour. “I told you back then in April that she was one foot out the door and she was going to retire. Behold, mystic Peña strikes again.”
Storm The Cage!
Seeing Nunes lay down her gloves inside the Octagon, ‘The Venezuelan Vixen’ contemplated doing an ambush from cageside.
“There was a part of me that really wanted to storm the cage,” Peña revealed. “I had so many people that were like, yes, we’ll do it, we’ll throw you over the gate. But then like my coach Wayne was like, don’t do it. You know, be classy and don’t do it. And so I let her have my moment. But it was really difficult for me because there was so many times where my urge was to go like, now’s the time, go, go, go. Now’s the time.”
“But, you know, at the end of the day, she’s retired, she’s off into the sunset. She’s dead to me at this point. We just gotta keep the division moving. Now we’re stepping into day one of the Pena Power era. I’m the synthetic champ. I’ve always been champ in my heart and in my head all the time. I wake up every day being like, ‘good morning champ, you look good’. So it’s just a matter of time before the belt’s around my waist.”
Julianna Peña says when she saw Nunes was going to retire there was apart of her that wanted to storm the cage.#TheMMAHour pic.twitter.com/rw5QVa3xqn
— Jed I. Goodman © (@jedigoodman) June 12, 2023
‘A Finish Is Better Than A Scorecard’
Peña and Nunes have fought twice, with Peña finishing ‘The Lioness’ in their first encounter and then Nunes dominating Pena in their rematch. The series is all tied up at 1-1, but Pena doesn’t seem to have a problem if it stays like that forever, arguing her win is better than Nunes’ win over her.
“As far as I’m concerned, I still have a one-up on her,” Peña continued. “She didn’t finish me [in the rematch]. I was literally coming at her the entire time. I ran out of time. Brass tacks, when it all comes down to things when she was supposed to be the greatest of all time, she tapped. She was asking for help to get out of there.
“A finish is better than a scorecard. She couldn’t finish me. I’m not gonna have a thorn on my side because as far as I’m concerned, I still have a win over her. If we’re in the streets, she’s dead, she already died.”
Do you agree with Julianna Peña’s remarks?
