Issue 141

May 2016

Miesha Tate’s UFC world title win was a dream come true but ‘Cupcake’ needs one more victory for the cherry on top of her career: revenge against Ronda Rousey.

The victory to claim the women’s UFC bantamweight belt was a long time coming for Miesha Tate, a blend of European and Native American, who grew up in Tacoma, Washington. It has been a 15-year journey for the self-confessed tomboy, who started wrestling at the age of 14, the only girl in the boys’ high school team.

For ‘Cupcake’, UFC 196 in Las Vegas was oh, so sweet. Not just the title for Tate, though. She put on a display of mastery, patience and experience to defeat Holly Holm and claim the title that had eluded her thanks to Ronda Rousey’s dominant championship reign. It was vindication for the growth of her professionalism, the team around her and her partnership with Bryan Caraway. But Rousey still awaits – and that trilogy fight.

UFC gold almost within her grasp once more, the 29-year-old had a different dance partner in Holm – and a different set of skills to maneuver against. She almost had it in the second round, but like her assault on the UFC crown itself, she took her chance at the second time of asking. When the opportunity arose again, in the fifth round, Tate took the triumph like it belonged to her. Emphatically, too, with a rear-naked choke put-to-sleep finish against a woman who had destroyed her nemesis – Rousey.

What was so impressive about Tate against Holm was that there was no rushing in – unlike Rousey. She used timing and brilliant opportunism to take her chance when it presented itself. In many ways, the fight with Holm serves as a metaphor for Tate’s comeback-queen style. If at first you don’t succeed, try, try, try again.

Her victory at UFC 196, at the MGM Grand Garden Arena, was the epitome of a fighting will and a champion who would not be denied.

Tomboy from Tacoma

Tate was enamored with combat from an early age. On the Tuesday of fight week in Las Vegas, USA Today featured her on its front page, highlighting that Tate has “a love for fighting” that began as a child who would decapitate Barbie dolls.

Tate recalled that as a young girl she had held one Barbie doll, handed another to her mother and the two engaged in hand-to-hand toy combat. Mom and daughter went at it with their plastic warriors, until a head popped off one of the figures.

“That’s how I determined the winner,” Tate explained. “Probably a good indication that I had a taste for competitive sports, I suppose.” Her mother? “She definitely wasn’t horrified,” Tate says. “She wasn’t like, ‘Yeah, let’s do it again.’ But she was totally down. She was like, ‘OK, we’re playing until the Barbies’ heads pop off.’”

It’s the distinction, Tate was making, between “people who can fight” and “people who love to fight.” We saw that right there in the UFC 196 Octagon, as Tate weathered Holm’s punches and kicks, and turned two rounds of the fight into a messy brawl. Her tactics were clear.

“Holly would always want to make it a clean, clinical fight,” she says. “My aim to is to make it my fight, to dictate, and turn it into a messy fight, to scramble, to get her out of her comfort zone.” She did just that for two of those rounds, taking a 10-8 score on all three judges’ cards in the second stanza. Round five, of course, was Tate’s moment.

Kill or be killed

Tate knew what she had to do when she stepped off her stool at the beginning of the fifth and final round. She knew three of the previous four rounds were against her. Her only route to victory and the belt was to drag Holm to the ground for a submission, the finish. It was risky, but a gamble she had to take.

“I definitely think she won most of the rounds – the first, third and fourth – even though it’s hard to know when you’re in there,” Tate recalls. “But I knew she was outpointing me so I had to gut it out and take risks. At the start of the fifth round, I thought to myself, ‘If she knocks me out, she knocks me out, but I’ve got to move forward, I’ve got to get that takedown, I’ve got to try to finish this.’ I knew that if I didn’t then I was going to lose a decision, so it was literally get knocked out or get the finish. It wasn’t going to the judges.”

Those judges scored the second round 10-8 for Tate, which she completely dominated after scoring an early takedown. Cupcake had been unable to find a similar opening through rounds three and four but knew her moment was upon her in the final frame.

“I felt really confident once we hit the ground. I knew on the ground I would find openings. As soon as we hit the ground I felt really good. All those years I’ve put in, wrestling since I was 15, it paid off. I knew the advantage was mine there. So when I got her down in the fifth round I went after her.”

Tate first dug in a standing rear-naked choke submission. But Holm slammed her over her head in a desperate attempt to break free. Only it literally played into Cupcake’s hands. “When she threw me forward it actually sunk the choke further in,” she explains. “As we landed my arm sank deeper under her chin. It really popped it and folded her neck over the choke. But she had to try something and that’s the heart of a champion, that’s what she’s got. She was going to go out giving it everything she had. And I give her props.”

Miss Congeniality

It wasn’t just the execution of her victory over Holm. Tate conducted herself like a true champion throughout fight week. Her growing popularity with the media is obvious. She has a grace and a charm that ought to be documented.

UFC 196 fight week was brutal on Tate, Holm, and indeed Conor McGregor and Nate Diaz. It was a heavy sell. Behind the scenes, they were pulled left and right with media and filming commitments. Tate had completed media duties all day, and stepped out of her hotel at 9pm on Wednesday of fight week, but still made time to talk under the eagle eyes of coach Caraway and southpaw sparring partner Travis Canaloc. They were unfazed by the endless requests, and Tate was in an ultra-relaxed state. It was strictly business, just as it was when the klaxon sounded inside the Octagon.

It was no different post-fight. She was savvy enough to begin the build-up for her next contest, even though a cupcake and a beer was all Tate said she wanted after the sweet success of victory. The new champion was cleverly quick to take the upper hand in the mind games against the woman who has beaten her twice. “I think Ronda is beating herself up over this,” she said with the 135lb belt around her waist.

“She’s obviously said that she’s so emotional to the point where she’s considering crazy things, and it’s like this is a broken woman. I don’t know if she’ll ever come back the same, but I have proven that I can come back from adversity, I do come back and I will come back. There’s no one in this sport that can break me.

“I have the strongest mindset of anybody in there. I don’t know where Ronda’s at with her mindset, but I have to wonder, is she ever going to come back the same?

“I was prepared and ready, and Ronda Rousey is saying November. I don’t want to sit and be idle. Her motivation is to have Travis Browne’s babies. She said it, not me. I lost the belt from her but my motivation, whenever I taste defeat, is always to get back on the horse and back to the top.”

Date with destiny

The stage is set for an almighty trilogy fight now between Tate and Rousey, which would be perfect for a featured slot at UFC 200 in July on the biggest stage of all. It’s a fight that looked unlikely when ‘Rowdy’ still held the belt with a 2-0 record over her rival. Yet Tate is undaunted by the defeats.

“For me, I want to do it again,” she says with a shrug. “I’ll fight Ronda as many times as they’ll let me. As many times as it takes for me to beat her. I keep saying the third time’s a charm. I’ve always been that kind of person, when you hurt me I come back harder and stronger, and I don’t diminish or break. That’s something I’ve always prided myself on. It’s just something you have or you don’t. Fight or flight. I only have the fight in me.”

Rousey, of course, is in a different place. She hasn’t fought since losing the bantamweight title and her undefeated record in a stunning upset loss to Holm at UFC 193 in Melbourne last November. Holm then did Tate a huge favor by offering her a route back to UFC gold. Likewise, Tate has now offered up Rousey an alternative path back to the belt – one that looks more favorable for ‘Rowdy’ than a return against the woman that knocked her unconscious and took her title.

If fans were wondering, the UFC has no doubt about what happens next. The pairing is a promotional dream. Dana White, the UFC president, believes Tate will fight Rousey next. At least that’s the plan. “Ronda will now fight Miesha Tate for the title – that’s what’s going to happen,” he told media in Las Vegas. “That’s what I said before this fight even happened. Whoever wins (between Holm and Tate) will fight Ronda for the title.”

So there we have it. Rousey-Tate, or perhaps now we should call it Tate-Rousey, has become a rivalry for the ages, and it is arguably greater now than it has ever been. Like Ali and Frazier, Shamrock and Ortiz, Tate and Rousey’s names and fighting spirits will go down in history with their two names intertwined. Tate knows this.

“What I really enjoy about the rivalry is that Ronda always gets the most out of me.” Tate adds with a smile. “She makes me a better fighter. She makes me more competitive and makes me want to work harder. I really think because of her I am a better fighter and a better athlete,.”

Try, try and try again. That’s Miesha Tate to a tee. In the end you get there, title around your waist. And now we are set for the mother of all trilogies between herself and Rousey, two polar opposites, and the best two women fighters in the world. Now all Tate wants to do is rip Rousey’s head off – as if she were a Barbie doll.

Six months later: From out in the cold to UFC gold

Miesha Tate was “considering her MMA future” six months ago after Holm was given a fight with Ronda Rousey instead. Today she’s the undisputed champion, with both Rousey and Holm chasing her.

#1: Stats don’t lie

Miesha Tate being crowned the UFC bantamweight champion of the world is especially fitting seeing as she’s the stats leader across the board for the female weight class.

Tate has recorded 11 wins in Strikeforce and UFC competition – more than any other woman. She’s also scored a record 27 takedowns in that time, and in 100% of the fights in which she has tried to put her opponent on the mat, she’s succeeded. No wonder she used to go by the moniker ‘Takedown’ Tate.