Preview: UFC on ABC 3 ‘Ortega vs. Rodriguez’

Women’s Flyweights

#10 WBW | Miesha Tate (19-8, 6-5 UFC) vs. #3 WFLW | Lauren Murphy (15-5, 7-5 UFC)

ODDS: Tate (-205), Murphy (+175)

Tate’s comeback has gone well enough, but it will be fascinating to see exactly how she looks at flyweight. Part of the generation that helped bring women’s mixed martial arts into the UFC, Tate was shockingly done with the sport at 30 years old after a rollercoaster 2016 campaign. After a memorable rivalry against Ronda Rousey, Tate kicked off 2016 with a come-from-behind victory over Holly Holm to claim the UFC’s bantamweight title—an inspirational performance that culminated a decade of hard work and seemingly set her up for a big-money title defense against her longtime nemesis. However, before Rousey could make her comeback, Tate got battered by Amanda Nunes at UFC 200 to lose her belt, and she announced her retirement after one more flat performance against Raquel Pennington. Tate eventually returned about a year ago and looked much more like her old self in beating Marion Reneau. Seemingly in a better place mentally, Tate put in her typical hard-nosed performance and showed none of the worrying tendencies that marked those career-ending fights. While it seemed like the bantamweight division was relatively static from where Tate left it back in 2016, her last fight against Ketlen Vieira did show that the Washington native finding her way back to championship success was not a lock. It was not an amazing performance from either woman, but Vieira consistently picked apart Tate’s pressure-heavy gameplan and walked away with a clear decision win over 25 minutes. There is probably still a route for Tate to get back into bantamweight title contention—particularly with the advantage of being one of the bigger names in the division—but she is instead making her first cut down to flyweight. We will all immediately find out whether or not she can become a contender at 125 pounds, as she faces a recent title challenger in Murphy.

Valentina Shevchenko’s past and future contenders at flyweight seem to either be physical young prospects or rugged vets getting some long-overdue credit, and Murphy is clearly in that latter category. Murphy came to the UFC back in 2014 with some shine as the Invicta Fighting Championships bantamweight titleholder, but it was not necessarily a guarantee that she would stick on the roster after her first two UFC bouts. Her grinding style made for nip-tuck affairs against Sara McMann and Liz Carmouche, with Murphy having the bad luck to lose both fights on the scorecards. However, Murphy eventually righted the ship and was helped greatly by the move to flyweight, which bought her some physical advantages and enough time to build out a solid striking game, making her a tough out now capable of actually making an impact on her fights. She eventually racked up five straight wins to get her shot at Shevchenko in September, though, as expected, she did not find much in the way of success. Now nearing 39 years old and with Shevchenko still entrenched at the top of the division, Murphy is unlikely to find her way back to top contender status, but she can still play spoiler, particularly in fights like these. This figures to be a grind, and it is a difficult fight to read thanks to the unknown of Tate’s weight cut. If she carries her strength down to 125 pounds, she should be able to bully Murphy without much issue, but there is not much room for slippage given how stout Murphy can be in the clinch. This is a pure toss-up. The pick is Tate via decision.

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Ortega vs. Rodriguez
Lemos vs. Waterson
Salikhov vs. Li
Mudaerji vs. Schnell
Burgos vs. Jourdain
Tate vs. Murphy
The Prelims