Ronda Rousey is one of the three most identifiable female athletes on the planet. Her stardom is unrivaled inside The Octagon. We are counting down the days in advance of her UFC women's bantamweight title fight against unbeaten Holly Holm at UFC 193 on Nov. 14 in Melbourne, Australia. It's the 30 Days of Ronda Rousey .
Ronda Rousey made her MMA debut on Aug. 6, 2010, defeating Hayden Munoz in 23 seconds by armbar for Combat Fight League. She competed two more times on the amateur circuit before making her pro debut against Ediane Gomes at King of the Cage on Mar. 27, 2011. It took Rousey a little bit longer, winning in 25 seconds by armbar.
Rousey is undefeated in 12 fights. She was the Strikeforce women's bantamweight champion before she was made the UFC champion in late 2012 after parent company, Zuffa bought the now-defunct company earlier that year. The "Rowdy" one has won every fight by stoppage and looks to continue her reign of terror when she faces Holly Holm at UFC 193 on Nov. 14.
While dominant inside the cage, she does have her critics.
"She has a different approach to her fighting, and that's the way she has wanted her career to go," Sara McMann (lost to Rousey at UFC 170) told Sporting News in the US.
"It appears she wanted to get to the top as soon as possible. For me, it's more about the journey. It's more about fighting all the girls in my division, knowing I'm the best and not just fighting the No. 1 girls. It means forcing myself to fight all different types of fighters and being able to beat them.
"She didn't prove anything new (in the fight)," Miesha Tate said after her loss to Rousey in Strikeforce in Mar. 2012.
"I would have appreciated and would have a lot more respect for her if after the fight was done and would have said, 'You know what, what's done is done. We did a great job selling this fight'. If she would handled it more maturely instead of just saying, 'Whatever, I don't feel bad about what I said,' and continued to talk trash afterwards. I think I pretty much lost respect for her after that."
Despite the critics she does have, there's no denying how great of a fighter Rousey is.
"She went to the Olympics for judo, so she's a bronze medalist and obviously she's very accomplished there," Julia Budd (lost to Rousey in Nov. 2011) told Sporting News.
"You can't take anything away from what she's done in the cage. She's 12-0, all by stoppage, nine wins by armbar in the first round."
Beyond the second Tate fight at UFC 168 where it went into the third round, Rousey hasn't been tested. There are those who feel Holm can be the one who tests her both mentally and physically, eventually walking out the champion.
"She hasn't been put in any positions where it would call to measure how big her heart is," Tate said.
"How big is her determination? When is her threshold? When is her quitting point?"
Regardless of what people think of her, Rousey put women's MMA on the map. Quite arguably, if Rousey wasn't around, women wouldn't be getting the recognition they deserve.
"Overall, I have to say she's good for women's MMA because she's been drawing attention," Tate said.
"We are getting more recognition and not getting stereotyped as just pretty faces."