In last night’s UFC on FOX 11 co-main event, Meisha Tate notched her first win in the UFC with a unanimous decision over Liz Carmouche. It was a fight between two former opponents of Champion Ronda Rousey, and both women were in desperate need of a win. Carmouche is coming off a loss to Alexis Davis, while Tate is making her return after failing to beat Rousey in their December re-match.
This bout shows how poorly the UFC has developed their women’s division. The Carmouche-Tate bout was a good fight between two opponents with similar skill levels. Both showed a lot of guts, and they didn’t fight a ‘girl fight’ that is demeaning, they fought a plain old ‘fight’. They are both impressive athletes who deserve co-main event status, but the fact that they fought such an even match only serves to highlight the chasm the UFC has created between the champion Ronsda Rousey and the rest of the field.
Since defeating Tate in December, Rousey also fought Sara McMann, the only athlete in the women’s league with an Olympic background similar to Rousey, and perhaps the only one for whom a title shot could even be remotely justified based on resume. Rousey didnt even break a sweat in breaking McMann.
The logical thing to do would have been to have Rousey dominate without the belt, By giving her the belt, the UFC basically said all the women except her suck. Dana White may have even used that word to describe the overall talent in the division himself before he drank the Rousey juice himself. She would have been winning and dominating, and people would be calling for the UFC to fill the vacant title. Instead,they gave her the belt and they do not know wher eto get opponents for Rousey.
It is clear that Carmouche and Tate will both be int he mix for the foreseeable future, and both are good fighters that but the best possible face on women’s MMA, but nothing in their fight tells me they have improved and deserve another shot at Rousey.
