Underdog role nothing new for UFC 219 title challenger Holly Holm
Holly Holm’s spectacular headkick knockout of Ronda Rousey in November 2015 changed the career trajectories for both fighters that night in Melbourne, Australia.
The shockwaves of the stunning upset even altered the future of Cris “Cyborg” Justino, who was watching the fight halfway around the world in Southern California.
Justino had long been considered the best 145-pound fighter in the world. But she had her sights set on somehow, some way securing a fight with Rousey, the champion at 135 pounds — the UFC’s heaviest female weight class.
Rousey’s defeat expanded Justino’s horizons.
“I had met Holly just before that fight because we shot a movie together,” Justino recalls. “Me and Ronda were having a hard time agreeing on that fight. I did everything to make that fight happen, but she always was just talk and never wanted to fight me really.
”I watched the fight and on that day said one day soon I’m going to fight Holly.”
It will finally happen Saturday in the main event of UFC 219 at T-Mobile Arena, which will be broadcast at 7 p.m. on pay-per-view.
The bout nearly happened in early 2017 when the UFC first created a 145-pound female division. Justino, however, was dealing with a potential violation of the anti-doping policy for which she was eventually cleared by USADA; Holm instead fought Germaine de Randamie for the inaugural belt, losing a controversial decision.
De Randamie abandoned the title rather than defend it against Justino, and Justino captured the vacant belt with a knockout of Tonya Evinger in July, her 18th consecutive victory.
Now Justino, who fought the establishment for so long just to get a chance at a big fight, will headline the UFC’s year-end card. And she won’t even have to play the ‘B’ side to Rousey to do it.
“My focus is on my next fight,” Justino said. “And maybe if I beat her people may say, ‘She’s the girl who could beat Ronda’ and I beat her, but I’m not focused on Ronda Rousey anymore.”
Neither is Holm, who was unbeaten when she defeated Rousey but lost her next three fights before ending the skid with a win over Bethe Correia in June.
She wants to be remembered for more than one highlight-reel knockout in Australia that changed the course of female MMA fighting. A win over another seemingly indestructible legend with a long winning streak a weight class up would surely seal Holm’s legacy.
“I’ve had some highs and some lows over the last two years,” she said. “I went from that big high to having a couple losses, and I’m taking this opportunity for a reason. I don’t want to just say I tried. I want to go in there and have a victory.
“It’ll be the greatest accomplishment in my life right now. I can’t ever compare the two because they’re two different situations. In my life right now, yes, this is going to be the biggest accomplishment I could have, but nothing can take away from the journey I had and the experience I had with my fight with Ronda. This is just its own journey. This is the fight that I have now. ”
Perhaps the biggest difference is Holm no longer has the advantage of flying completely under the radar.
“There may be some more pressure this time because people say, ‘You shocked the world once, you’re going to do it again,’” she said. “Before nobody believed in me. Now there’s more of a curiosity behind it, not necessarily thinking I can’t do it but kind of, ‘I wonder if she can do it again.’”
Contact Adam Hill at ahill@reviewjournal.com or 702-277-8028. Follow @AdamHillLVRJ on Twitter.
