Before we discuss Sarah Kaufman’s optimistic attitude towards women in MMA continuing with ZUFFA’s purchase of Strikeforce, we first need to remember that time when Kaufman broke the Canadian nuclear treaty at Strikeforce Challengers when she executed a power-bomb on Roxanne Modafferi. We still have the animated .gif floating around on the MiddleEasy servers, effectively knocking out other animated .gifs on the server with ease. It marked the first time in the history of ESPN in which a female fighter made it onto Sportcenter’s coveted ‘Top Ten List’.
Now that ZUFFA has acquired Strikeforce in an amount that exceeds $40 million, Sarah Kaufman is fairly confident there will be a place for women in a post-ZUFFA Strikeforce. Ben Fowlkes from MMAFighting caught up with the former Strikeforce champion to get her take on a topic that probably still has your mind absolutely blown.
“I think one of two things can happen The first is that they embrace the females and still try to push them using the Strikeforce venue and then maybe pulling them over [into the UFC]. That would be great, if that were to happen. The second option would be, they run the contracts out and then that’s it. I’m definitely hoping for the former, but I’m preparing for the latter.”
“I honestly don’t know what else could be done. There have been some really exciting fights that the females have put on. I’m positive that Dana White and [UFC matchmaker] Joe Silva and the whole crew have kept an eye on shows where there are female fights, and I’m sure they know that there are some good female fights out there. Dana tries to use the point that the divisions aren’t deep enough, and that is changing, but we need the opportunity to fight and promote and get more females into the sport.”
“I really hope that maybe the fans or anyone who can help push the females, I really hope that they stand up for us and prove to Zuffa that they want to see us. Then hopefully they’ll listen and we’ll get to stay.”
We already know Dana White’s opinion on women in MMA, and it’s not that promising for the female divisions that are currently in Strikeforce. If by some highly predictable circumstance ZUFFA absorbs the Strikeforce roster, the fate of women in MMA will be under the control of an organization that has never let women compete in MMA, ever. [Source]
