Julianna Peña declares herself women’s MMA GOAT, says featherweight is ‘a fake division’
Julianna Peña thinks an awful lot of herself.
Over the weekend, Amanda Nunes defended her UFC bantamweight title with a unanimous decision victory over Irene Aldana at UFC 289. Immediately after the fight, Nunes retired from MMA, leaving most fans and fighters to declare her the greatest female MMA fighter of all time; most, but not all, because Peña disagrees.
“The greatest female fighter of all time, according to me, is me,” Peña told said this week on The MMA Hour. “You want to know why? Because I’m not a fighter, I’m a warrior. I’m a warrior that lives inside and there’s a difference. Amanda’s a fighter, I’m a warrior. I’m the greatest warrior, I’m the greatest fighter of all-time, and I believe that with my heart because I never stop coming. You’re going to have to put me to sleep or knock me the f*** out to get me to stop coming after you. Bet.”
Peña and Nunes have a long history with one another, most of it acrimonious. For years, Peña chased a fight with the bantamweight champion, and when she finally got it, “The Venezuelan Vixen” backed up her trash talk, submitting Nunes in the second round UFC 269. Nunes won an immediate rematch a few months later at UFC 277, and the two were supposed to fight again at UFC 289 before Peña was forced out of the fight due to injury. Now Peña will never get the chance to win it back, but she maintains that she’s still ahead in the overall competition.
“I believe that a submission finish is more dominant than any scorecard you could put in front of me,” Peña said.
“As far as I’m concerned, I still have a one up on her. She didn’t finish me, I was coming at her the entire time, I ran out of time. Brass tacks, when it all comes down to things, when she was supposed to be the greatest of all time, she tapped! She was asking for help to get out of there. So like I said, a finish is better than a scorecard. She couldn’t finish me. I’m not going to have a thorn in my side, because as far as I’m concerned, I still have a win over her. If we’re in the streets, she’s dead. She already died.”
Of course, the greatest of all time conversation is about more than head-to-head matchups, and in that regard, Peña trails pretty far behind Nunes. Nunes’ eight title defenses across two divisions is tied for fourth all-time with Jon Jones, and her 11 wins in title fights also ties her for fourth all-time, with Anderson Silva. Peña, in contrast, has one title win and zero successful defenses to her name. But Peña quibbles with some of Nunes’ title wins, calling her entire featherweight reign a sham.
“You want to talk about this, we can talk about it,” Peña said. “At the end of the day, they made that 145-pound division for Cris Cyborg, only. When she beat Cris Cyborg, there was nobody else. What, Megan Anderson, who fights at 135 but bumped up to 145 for a shot at the title? And then, Felicia Spencer, once again, can’t make 135; 145 is where people go that can’t make 135. But do me a favor, name 10 rostered UFC [featherweights]. ... Doesn’t exist. There are none. It’s a fake belt. It’s a fake belt!
“So that being said, she says, ‘Oh yeah, I’m the champ-champ, I’ve done it all,’ and Dana says, ‘Yeah, we’re getting rid of that division and retiring it.’ [She says,] ‘Yeah, retire it! They know what they’re doing.’ OK, so you agree, it’s fake. There’s nobody there to fight. You’re a champion of a fake division! Enjoy! I don’t know you want me to say. It was a fake belt at 145. It was so real that they’re [ending] it completely.”
Real or not, Nunes goes down as one of only four simultaneous multi-division champions, and in all likelihood will go down as the last and longest-reigning women’s featherweight champion, something she appears to take a lot of pride in. After her win at UFC 289, Nunes declared that, since she’s retiring with the titles, she will remain the champion forever, and that the future UFC women’s bantamweight titles will be “fake forever.” And of course, Peña, who will most likely fight for the vacant title next, doesn’t think much of that claim.
“She’s got to say that,” Peña said. “She has to say that. At the end of the day, she’s dead to me and my job is to make everybody forget about Amanda Nunes.”
Given all Nunes’ remarkable accomplishments in the sport, that’s going to be a tall task.