Rose Namajunas defended her UFC strawweight title this past week at UFC 268. Both women faced each other in the co-main event, and the fight did not disappoint. Weili posed some problems for the champion, but Namajunas eventually was able to get the win. She won the fight via a split decision.
With the win, she has now won three fights in a row and has a total of nine victories in the UFC. When asked about when she would like to come back into the octagon, she said April 2022 would be ideal. However, it can be sooner than that. She didn’t have any injuries before or during the fight, but she was worried about one thing.
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She said, “Going into this one, I wasn’t sure if my eye was ok. And then it turned out to be fine, but I did have a little bit of a scare for a moment. I’m just glad now that everything’s fine and I can compete. I’m just gonna have to check everything up and make sure everything is 100 percent before I jump on the train of, yeah let’s go.”
Talking about the injury, she said, “It was a headbutt… It feels better now, but yeah it was a scare because I wasn’t sure if it was like, is this career-ending? Is it like, not just for the fight but I was like, what the f**k. But, I got everything cleared and everything is fine.”
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Is Rose Namajunas vs. Carla Esparza the fight to make?
Carla Esparza is the number 2 ranked UFC strawweight fighter and is undefeated in her last five fights. ‘Cookie Monster‘ was the inaugural UFC strawweight champion, and she beat Rose Namajunas for the title. After beating Zhang Weili, many think Esparza to be the next contender for the title.
The champ herself thinks she is the rightful contender. In an interview with Ariel Helwani, she said she would like to fight Esparza. According to Namajunas, “I would like to, yeah, I would like to. I don’t see what anything else makes like sense.”
However, UFC President is not ready to acknowledge her as the number one contender. At the UFC 268 post-fight presser, White was asked if she makes sense as the next fight, or they have options for Rose. He said, “We have an option. You don’t sit around waiting for fights, it’s a really bad idea.”
Do you think it’s fair if Esparza gets a title shot? Who else can White be talking about? Let us know in the comments!
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