Thoughts on Ronda Rousey

Ronda Rousey won the Strikeforce Bantamweight Championship last week in only her 5th pro fight, and she did so spectacularly.  Everyone has to respect her talent at this point, though not everyone likes the "trash talk." 

Love her or hate her for that, here's another thing that I think everyone has to respect:  in a very short period of time, she has accomplished some audacious goals.  In about one year, she has gone from nothing to top of the ranks in Women's MMA.  Say what you will about the talent pool, but she went from nowhere, rank-wise, to #1 fighting people who fight for living - and she did it in ONE YEAR.  That's crazy.  Equally impressive, though, she has almost singlehandedly skyrocketed the interest in Women's MMA.  In this interview, she said "I'm doing all I can to try and make WMMA seem more profitable," and she has otherwise made no secret of her desire to boost ratings by hook or by crook.  But holy crap... she did it, and she did it all by herself!  The internet was abuzz about this fight both before and after it happened... How many women's fights have gotten that kind of attention?

So here's a weird comparison - Kano.  Dr. Jigoro Kano, the founder of Judo.  The guy on the right.  Don't see the resemblance?  Well, he was a badass from a technical martial arts perspective, he had some crazy ambitions which he achieved in a crazy-short period of time, and he understood both the importance of marketing and how to succeed at it (see this post for more thoughts on Kano).  Of course, his tactics didn't feature shit-talk and tight shorts, but that probably wouldn't have worked so well for him, even in his younger years.