Dana White says the UFC’s women’s divisions exist because Ronda Rousey cornered him at an event and asked for a few minutes of his time. Speaking with Steven Bartlett on The Diary of a CEO podcast, the UFC CEO admitted he had no interest in putting women in the Octagon until that conversation.
His reasoning was commercial. White explained that he was already struggling to sell a brutal sport to TV networks and sponsors, and he believed women fighting would be an even tougher pitch. “I didn’t want women in the UFC, right?” White said. “And the reasoning is, I was trying to sell men to networks and sponsors.”
Then Rousey showed up. “Ronda Rousey grabbed me at an event, said, ‘Hey, I’m Ronda Rousey. Can I get 15 minutes with you?’ We went into my room at the arena and, I don’t know, minutes into the conversation, I’m like, ‘Holy s**t. I think I’m going to do this,’ and she’s the one to do it with, you know?”
White also pushed back on her critics, telling Bartlett that a lot of people want to hate on Rousey these days. His verdict: “She is a f***ing unicorn.”
From “never” to a main event
The turnaround was fast. Bloody Elbow pointed out that in 2011, White answered a question about when the UFC would start booking women’s fights with one word: never. Roughly a year later he signed Rousey, a former Olympian, and the first women’s fight in UFC history headlined UFC 157 on Feb. 23, 2013. Rousey beat Liz Carmouche with a first-round armbar to become the inaugural women’s bantamweight champion.
She held the belt for two years and defended it six times, a division record that still stands. The run ended on her seventh defense. After a year away she returned at UFC 207 and lost to Amanda Nunes by first-round TKO, and she never fought in the UFC again. She moved on to WWE, where she won multiple championships, and the UFC made her the first woman inducted into its Hall of Fame. Earlier this year, Rousey returned to MMA against Gina Carano and retired after the fight.
Her name keeps popping up in front-office conversations, too. Former welterweight title challenger Dan Hardy recently said a fresh voice might help the UFC’s promotion. “I think maybe Dana’s time in mixed martial arts has passed,” Hardy said, adding that he’d picked up a vibe that Rousey wanted the face-of-the-company job someday. “I could see Ronda going for it.”
Quick take
Credit to White for saying the quiet part plainly. The 2011 “never” was about the sales pitch to networks and sponsors, and Rousey fixed it by being the pitch herself. What sold that room, though, was the judo. A champion who finished people with the armbar the way she did gave the UFC something no marketing deck could, and that gave every woman who followed a division to walk into. Natalia Silva is a UFC champion today, and that line runs straight back to a 15-minute meeting in an arena back room.
