Ronda Rousey Comes To The Defense Of UFC Reebok Deal
Ronda Rousey was around for only a brief time after the UFC got the Reebok deal. However she still feels like it is a good thing for the sport, and for the athletes.
Rousey is a polarizing figure inside of MMA, to say the least. Her sour departure from the UFC left a bad taste in the mouths of many fans. Most recently, she has started alienating herself from the pro wrestling fans she has acquired in her short time following those ventures, while speaking on Steve-O’s podcast.
However at the same time as speaking on her WWE experience, Ronda Rousey was also asked about some things from her UFC tenure. In particular, Steve-O asked the former bantamweight champ about her thoughts on the Reebok deal, and it’s affects on fighters. Although he feels like it is not good for the fighters, and a step back, she actually disagreed.
“Well, I mean it’s not that they get nothing,” Rousey said. “It’s that everybody gets a split share. So instead of a whole bunch of people having a whole bunch of individual sponsors all over themself, everybody gets a share of the Reebok sponsor, whatever they’re paying.
“If you think about, like are any of the NFL players allowed to have individual sponsorships?” she continued. “I mean are basketball players allowed to put, you know, CondomDepot.com on themselves? It gets to the point where like, (in the) WWE are you allowed to come out to Guns R Us on your titties? It’s kind of the standard that has been set by other sports. They UFC was unique in that, and when they were smaller, that was part of the hustle. As they got bigger and mainstream some of those smaller characteristics kind of got lost, because if they wanted to be looked at on the same level as the NBA and the NFL and f–king baseball and all that s–t, they have to kind of adapt their model a little more.”
Now Rousey did go on to that she wants to see the UFC get bigger sponsorships, worth more money. Moreover she does bring up good points, regarding other sports. On the other hand, it is important to remember that the other sports have unions to decide these things, whereas the UFC makes all the decisions for the fighters without any input.
What do you think of these comments from Ronda Rousey?
