Ronda Rousey’s comeback was a one-and-done situation, but what about Gina Carano? The 44-year-old former Strikeforce champion has an inspirational tale to tell of how she dropped 100 pounds for her big Netflix fight against Rousey, but the fight itself was demoralizing: it took just 17 seconds for Rousey to take Carano down and tap her.
Carano can take solace in the fact that 95% of all WMMA would get finished this way by “Rowdy,” who now has nine submission wins in under 60 seconds. It still can’t feel great to do all that work and preparation for an MMA fight only to get submitted before you even land a decent punch.
Gina’s post-loss statement hasn’t hinted at what’s next for her, but her coach John Wood at Syndicate MMA has high hopes that Carano will fight again.
“I do not believe that itch has been scratched yet for Gina, but we’ll see,” Wood told Home of Fight. “There’s a lot of things already coming at her. I could tell you, behind the scenes, there’s a lot of activity already. So ultimately, the decision is hers. This was never a need for money. This was a personal thing for her to come back and and do this. And honestly, truthfully, for me, she found the love of fighting again, and as a coach, I see somebody in the room who, she can still fight, dude, and there’s a lot of people that she can still beat. I guarantee it.”
“I think with the right match-ups, fair match-ups, that we could have some fun out there,” he said. “So we’ll see what she decides to do. If I’m a betting man, and I’m not speaking for her at all, I personally would like to see her do it again.”
Much has been made of Carano’s amazing transformation from pre-diabetic shape to fighting fit. That’s great, but it meant a lot of time in the gym was spent on getting her in shape rather than sharpening her weapons.
“I personally would like to see her take the work that we did and actually have another camp that would be focused on just fighting,” Wood said. “Because all the hard work, the bulls–t, the weight cut, has been done. I would love to see her have another camp and and do a fun fight. Do I think she’s gonna do it? I would lean more to yes than no.”
“I feel like there’s going to be that same thing that Ronda had, that empty hole that was left in there. I think that Gina’s gonna have that now after going through this process and being fired up. I think for myself that maybe we see another one.”
By the end of her original MMA run, Gina Carano was quickly becoming a Hollywood star. After everything that’s happened in the world, her cancellation in 2021 seems pretty silly. There’s a good chance the massive Netflix numbers generated by her fight make Hollywood reconsider “Conviction” as a viable draw. Does she even need to fight again? Probably not. But after getting blanked in 17 seconds, one more fun fight to show off what you’ve still got doesn’t sound bad either.
