Since coming up short in her bid to dethrone Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) women's bantamweight champion, Ronda Rousey, back at UFC 184 (video replay here), Cat Zingano has shied away from the limelight.
Understandably so, as losing the biggest fight of your mixed martial arts (MMA) career in just 14 seconds is not something you want to relive over and over. But after getting away for a bit, "Alpha" stopped by The MMA Hour to talk about her heartbreaking loss to "Rowdy."
Her words:
"I am disappointed. I am pretty fired up about how I performed and getting caught like that. It was a huge opportunity. It's kind of like the perfect wave in surfing. I wanted to catch it and do something amazing. Instead, I flopped in the water and that sucks. But it's kind of a good slap in the face. It forced me to regroup, regain composure and come back stronger and when the time is right, go back in there and fix it."
Despite the outcome, Cat says if she could do it all over again, she would come out with the same aggressiveness because at the end of the day, that's just who she is.
"I walked into the cage and I was pacing there just waiting for her to get in and it came to me that I really wanted to get going and get started as soon as that door was shut. There is something that needs to be said about people saying I'm a slow starter. If I were to define myself, I wouldn't call myself a slow starter. I would say I'm a reckless starter. Nine time out of 10 it works out for me, and that small percentage of the time it doesn't. I wouldn't change a thing about my approach. Had it been a couple of inches in the other direction, it could have gone a completely different way. I'll continue to stay true to myself and I will always be the fighter I am. I am really excited to go out there and fix it to get me redemption."
Still, Zingano admits the one mistake she did in coming out guns blazing is trying to do it for others and prove them wrong instead of doing it for herself. Something she says ultimately "slapped her in the face."
Not one to stay down for long, Zingano chalks up the loss to experience and is determined to bounce back stronger than ever. And says should she ever get a rematch against Ronda, the results will be different.
"On one hand, if I am going to have my first loss in MMA as a pro, to have it be to the world champion, that's not horrible. To lose that quickly, yeah, it's horrible. But, I also know that being a competitor in these types of sports, you get caught. It happens and to have it happen that fast, it sucks. But, I also know and she knows and I think all of our coaches and the promotion collectively knows that 999 times out of 1000 that wouldn't happen again. I think that sets us up for a really good fight should they give us the rematch sometime soon. I'll do whatever it takes to get to that point. It's not a fluke, Ronda is that good and she caught the arm and that's what happens. But I am a better athlete than what that showed of me and I want to fix it."
Perhaps a fight against Alexis Davis -- who also suffered a quick loss to Rousey -- would be a good welcome back challenge for the top contender and get her closer to another fight with the champ.
Any objections?
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