Ronda Rousey responded to Laila Ali's recent statement, saying that no woman alive can beat her in a fight, including the undefeated women's bantamweight champion.
TMZ reported that Ali said she can beat Rousey, especially because she has the size advantage.
Ali said, "She's like the size of my daughter, my 3-year old."
Subsequently, Ali clarified her statements on Twitter, saying that she is already retired and that her statements were blown out of proportion. Ali does have an impressive resume, remaining unbeaten 24-0 during her boxing tenure. She retired in 2007.
Daily Beast reported that Rousey was willing and ready to get it on with Muhammad Ali's daughter anytime.
Rousey said, "If she wants to take me up on that, I'm around. She's retired and has several kids. I understand why she'd think that because she has a size advantage, but if you saw my last fight it had nothing to do with size or strength at all. That's not how I beat people. So you can't count having a size and strength advantage as having a real advantage against me."
Yahoo Sports said that despite Ali clarifying the issue, putting the names of the two alpha ladies together is sure to garner attention. Rousey remains undefeated with an 11-0 record. She last defeated Cat Zingano at UFC 184 at a record 14 seconds. Prior to that, she defeated Alexa Davis in 16 seconds.
Ali also mentioned that it would be difficult for the two of them to meet in the ring because they belong to different classes. Ali was listed at 5'10" and hovering at around 160 pounds while Rousey is listed at 5'7" or less and weighs around 135 pounds. The two would also have to determine whether they would slug it out in a boxing match or give Rousey the advantage by doing mixed martial arts.
Bloody Elbow notes that Rousey has garnered a lot of attention, especially after her victory against Zingano and her appearance on the pages of the 2015 Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue.
During her talk with Daily Beast, Rousey reiterated her opposing stance against the possibility of a man versus woman match in the UFC.
She said, "I don't think it's a great idea to have a man hitting a woman on television. I'll never say that I'll lose, but you could have a girl getting totally beat up on TV by a guy-which is a bad image to put across. With all the football [domestic violence] stuff that's been happening, not a good idea. It's fun to theorize about and talk about, but it's something that's much better in theory than fact."