For all the soul-searching UFC president Dana White had to do before instituting a women’s bantamweight class, the division has performed quite admirably in its nearly four years of existence. Women’s 135-pounders have headlined eight events during that time, with enough success to spin off two other divisions.
The truth of the matter, however, is that most of that flourishing has largely been on the strength of Ronda Rousey, who main evented six of those shows and whose massive name helped make bigger stars of those who defeated her.
On Saturday night, the UFC (and FOX) experiment for the first time with a show top-lined by two bantamweights with no real connection to Rousey: Valentina Shevchenko and Julianna Pena.
The fighters came to prominence in quite different ways. Shevchenko’s rise was a slow burn, including an extensive and wildly successful kickboxing career that ran concurrent to her MMA career until she was signed by the UFC.
Pena, meanwhile, took advantage of an invitation to The Ultimate Fighter after just six pro fights and has won four straight since then to vault near the top of the division.
While the bout certainly has stakes for the two combatants, it’s also meaningful for the division. Joining me to discuss it is MMA Lead Writer Chad Dundas.
Mike Chiappetta: To me, this fight does give off the feeling that the UFC is trying to push forward into a (possibly) post-Rousey world.
And I do think that's to the UFC’s credit. It would have been easy to look at this card and put Donald Cerrone and Jorge Masvidal on the big poster and call it a day. The UFC has spent much more time and money pushing Cerrone than either Shevchenko or Pena. He is without question a bigger star than either of them.
Yet it didn’t do that. And the reason is because there is something to be gained for the UFC regardless of the outcome. The new-look UFC is about identifying and creating stars. This is a setup for that. Shevchenko may not seem the part given her soft-spoken demeanor, but the Kyrgyzstan-born fighter is potentially a key cog for UFC as it attempts to enter the Russian market.
Meanwhile, Pena is a feisty American who has shown a certain fearlessness in lashing out at Rousey and the UFC. That’s a trait that the promotion has to begrudgingly understand may translate into attention when she’s focused on a more positive goal like chasing the belt or, you know, selling tickets.
By and large, this is a positive for both the weight class and for the UFC. If Shevchenko and Pena can go out on Saturday and deliver a strong effort, they won’t necessarily ensure the continued support of the division, but it will guarantee that the promotion has to consider plans for future growth.
Am I being too optimistic here, Chad? Is this nothing more than the UFC filling up a main event slot with whatever was available, or are there real possibilities in the offing?
Chad Dundas: I think there's certainly some cause for (cautious) optimism here, Mike. As you noted, Shevchenko vs. Pena headlining one of the UFC's highest-profile events during the first quarter of 2017 is a great sign that the division is ready to move out of Rousey's shadow.
Even during the 13 months she spent away after her knockout loss to Holly Holm at UFC 193, all the most visible storylines at 135 pounds during 2016 still revolved around the former champion. Now that her defeat by Amanda Nunes at UFC 205 has made Rousey's absence feel more permanent, it's great to see matchmakers rolling the dice to try to give Shevchenko and Pena a little shine.
It may even be one of our first real clues about how new owners at WME-IMG might use the UFC's potent public relations machine. It's possible that future vision might involve leaning a bit less on pay-per-view and a bit more on using the exposure of the UFC's network TV deal to try to introduce new stars to the widest possible viewing audience.
It's also a good sign that this bout will assumedly be to determine the next challenger for Nunes' title. That way, you're effectively promoting Shevchenko, Pena and that champion all at once.
However, the elephant in the room and the possible downside here is pretty obvious: Will anybody tune in to watch this event?
It's great that the UFC is giving these women the chance to catch on with the public, but to date the public has largely only been interested in Rousey. If this event fails to score a decent TV rating and the resulting bout with Nunes doesn't move the PPV needle, it's possible women's MMA is closer to a star-power crisis than we're willing to admit.
You see what I did there, Mike? I subtly shifted this conversation away from your sunny, coastal optimism to my own dreary, Pacific Northwest pessimism. So I'll flip the question on you. Now, am I being too negative? Or will a women's bantamweight division without Ronda Rousey find itself in deep water sooner rather than later?
MC: The female bantamweights—and the female UFC divisions in general—aren’t facing any problem that the rest of the UFC roster doesn’t have.
Take Conor McGregor away from the lightweights (and featherweights), and who exactly is your big-money drawing card? Remove Nick and Nate Diaz from the talent pool, and who is replacing their lightning-bolt ability?
Does women’s MMA have a star-power crisis in its future? Or does MMA have a star-power crisis in its future?
The long and short of it is that no one knows. Rousey burst on the scene nearly fully formed. McGregor came in with a wave of energy and a country afire with pride. There isn’t anyone in particular we can point to who is generating such momentum, but the fact is that we may not be able to recognize it until we’re already in the midst of it.
The other possibility is that maybe we are set for a down cycle. White is fond of noting that people offered the same kinds of gloomy outlooks when Chuck Liddell and Randy Couture were on the way out, and the UFC survived just fine.
That may be true, but as anyone who plays the stock market has heard a million times, “past performance is not indicative of future results.”
Past stars don’t guarantee future ones.
Which brings us back to Saturday night. What I like about this matchup is that the UFC is proactively marketing a division it’s had success with, offering an opportunity when it could have easily gone in different directions.
Cerrone, for instance, as great as he is, has probably reached his ceiling. He’s fun to watch, he’s reliable, he’ll say some stuff that will cause some controversy, but he’s never quite broken through to that next level of stars. On a card, he’s a great supporting talent, but even after 23 UFC fights, he hasn’t made it as a leading man.
Pena and Shevchenko at least offer fresh faces and may draw a different demographic. It’s no secret that the UFC will begin shopping its television deal at the end of the year; featuring women fighters on the card is a great way to show a diversity of both product and audience.
In the end though, we tend to care most about the quality of the fights. Will we leave entertained or not? Will we leave feeling that we saw a potential champion emerge? That matters, too.
Chad, will it be enough for the UFC to have that kind of outcome? Does it need to pop a monster rating on an otherwise light night of sports programming to consider this a home run, or should the UFC consider it a win if it can come out with a clear challenger for Nunes and make everyone forget about Rousey?
CD: I think either one will work just fine.
It would be nice to score a monster number during the dead week between the NFL's conference championship games and the Super Bowl. It would also be nice to roll out of this feeling like Shevchenko/Pena vs. Nunes will be a surefire Fight of the Year contender.
But I'm not sure I'm expecting either, and I also think that's OK. It's enough to me that the UFC is putting two women's bantamweights not named Ronda Rousey in this spot. I find that to be a comforting sign for the future.
I also think this is one of those perfect matchmaking situations where it doesn't really matter who wins.
You make a good point that Shevchenko could potentially be important to the UFC's desire to push into the Russian market, but I would've thought it was Pena the organization had its eye on here.
Since winning Season 18 of TUF in 2013 she's flashed what one might describe as a Rousey-style attitude toward the competition and her bosses. She's also gone 4-0, including wins over recognizable bantamweights like Jessica Eye and Cat Zingano.
So far, she's only been slowed by injury and trouble of her own making outside the cage. She's still just 27 years old, so if she can stay healthy and keep from disqualifying herself from competition, it seems likely she'll fashion herself into a name to know in this division.
Nobody's going to make observers forget about Rousey, though. Despite the outpouring of negative feelings about her after her two losses, Shevchenko and Pena wouldn't be fighting in a main event on Fox if not for her.
I think her memory will continue to loom large, even as the company she left behind endeavors to find its way forward without her.