Is WWE's Ronda Rousey Returning to The UFC?

By Connor Casey

Rumors of Ronda Rousey making an MMA return to The UFC have been spreading online over the past few weeks. After it was revealed that the former Raw and SmackDown Women's Champion had a "hard out" on her current WWE contract, there was speculation online that she might be headed back to The UFC for one more fight. The UFC Hall of Famer built up a 12-0 undefeated streak in MMA, including five consecutive wins and becoming the inaugural UFC Women's Bantamweight Champion, her momentum came to a screeching halt at UFC 193 in November 2015 when she lost via KO to Holly Holm. She then returned to The Octagon in December 2016 for a title bout against Amanda Nunes but lost in the opening minute. While never officially announcing her MMA retirement, she was inducted into The UFC Hall of Famer in 2018. 

That speculation increased this week when UFC featherweight Chelsea Chandler casually mentioned during the UFC Vegas 77 media day that she'd heard Rousey was preparing for a comeback. However, MMA Fighting's Ariel Helwani shot down that idea by tweeting out, "Ronda Rousey is not considering a UFC comeback, I'm told. No truth to the rumors started yesterday."

Ronda Rousey "Demanded" A Tag Title Reign With Shayna Baszler

Rousey and fellow former MMA fighter Shayna Baszler finally got their hands on the WWE Women's Tag Team Championships in late May. While their reign would only last a month before Baszler turned on Rousey, it was something Rousey had to force with WWE officials backstage as it had been consistently pushed out in favor of other ideas. 

"Ronda is Ronda, right. She's been (involved with the) main title, she main evented WrestleMania. She still gets one of the loudest pops when we walk out. This was something she demanded," Baszler explained in an interview with Cheap Heat back in June. "We'd been asking for it forever, but she finally put her foot down and went to the office and said, 'Listen, we've been asking for this forever. You keep telling us, 'After, after, after this [and] this.'"

"I honestly don't know if she hadn't done that, if they ever would have got to it," she continued. "I wasn't in a position yet to be elevated to a Ronda level, so the fact that Ronda said, 'No, stop. I've done this. I want to do this because this is why I started wrestling.' So I think that's huge. She could be main-eventing SummerSlam. She doesn't have to be where she is, which is elevating these titles."

WWE SummerSlam 2023 Rumored Card

  • Undisputed WWE Universal Championship: Roman Reigns vs. Jey Uso
  • Intercontinental Championship: Gunther vs. Drew McIntyre
  • SmackDown Women's Championship: Asuka vs. Charlotte Flair vs. Bianca Belair
  • Undisputed WWE Tag Team Championships: Kevin Owens & Sami Zayn vs. TBA
  • Cody Rhodes vs. Brock Lesnar (with some sort of stipulation)
  • Becky Lynch vs. Trish Stratus
  • Ronda Rousey vs. Shayna Baszler
  • Ricochet vs. Logan Paul
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