Dana White has been saying that Meisha Tate would get her trilogy fight against Ronda Rousey ever since Meisha’s victory over Jessica Eye a month ago and her 4 fight winning streak against Top-10 opponents seemed to justify that decision. That was all before this morning GMA announcement stating that Ronda would fight former #1 P4P female boxer Holly Holm at UFC 195.
Tate has yet to speak publicly about the decision but her manager spoke with MMAFighting.com this morning and seemed absolutely blindsided by the announcement.
“I’m absolutely shocked,” said Josh Jones. “I found out just like you did. Very disappointed to hear the news.”
“I want to know the reasons behind [the decision],” Jones said. “To not even be given a head’s up is very disappointing. She doesn’t even know yet. She is going to be absolutely shocked.”
Jones said Tate had already begun training for the Rousey trilogy fight, and her sponsors were already under the assumption she was fighting Rousey next.
Everyone assumed that if Tate was to be skipped over by anyone that it would be Cris Cyborg. The news of Holly Holm receiving the title shot is shocking because Holm looked relatively average in her 2 UFC fights and that was against opponents outside of the Top-10. She has yet to face a fighter the caliber of Tate, let alone Ronda. With that being said it’s pretty low odd for the UFC to not give Tate a heads up about the decision to have Holm as Ronda’s opponent. It’s reminiscent of when LeBron announced his decision to go to Miami without warning the Cavaliers.
One could assume that Holm’s age, 33, and decorated boxing background forced the UFC to give a closer look at the match up. Holm vs Rousey wouldn’t be nearly as interesting if Holm was 35 years old and slowing down. There’s also the fact of her taking a loss to a top 5 opponent and losing out on the intrigue of yet another undefeated fighter to oppose Rousey.
No one that’s seen Holm’s last two fights can honestly say that she is in the same stratosphere as Ronda but the ability to sell KO power (which hasn’t shown itself in the UFC) and pedigree is enough to sell to the casual fan.
It looks like Meisha will have to take another fight or two before getting another shot at the title.