Ronda Rousey Talks How WWE Influenced Her UFC Career

UFC President Dana White once famously said fans would never see women in the UFC. Then Ronda Rousey changed everything. Rousey recently published a video on her YouTube channel of her telling D-Von Dudley just how WWE influenced her during her UFC career.

“I wanted to make women’s MMA take off and I was looking at what the women’s fights didn’t have that the men’s had,” Rousey said. “Because women could have exciting fights but nobody gave a s**t and I was trying to figure out why nobody gave a s**t.”

Rousey then used pro-wrestling terminology to illustrate why she felt nobody cared about women’s MMA at the time.

“It was because everyone was babyface,” Rousey said. “And there was no story and so I was like ‘all these girls need is a real heel.'”

D-Von then asked Rousey if the persona she was portraying at the time was influenced by pro-wrestling.

“100%,” Rousey said. “I was basically doing an impression of Roddy Piper with an impression of the Diaz brothers.”

D-Von then asked Rousey if not shaking Meisha Tate’s hand after their second fight was part of her building storylines in women’s MMA.

“No,” Rousey responded. “I started it just as a persona then she started making it personal so I was like ‘f**k that b**ch.'”