Women’s Strawweights
Tabatha Ricci (7-1, 2-1 UFC) vs. #15 WSW | Jessica Penne (14-6, 3-4 UFC)Despite losing her last fight, Penne’s comeback has gone much better than expected. A former Invicta Fighting Championships titleholder at atomweight, she was one of the top strawweights in the UFC when the promotion launched the division in 2014. Coming off her season of “The Ultimate Fighter,” all it took was a split decision win over Randa Markos for Penne to become Joanna Jedrzejczyk’s top contender. That looked to be the beginning of the end for Penne’s UFC success. Her loss to Jedrzejczyk was a thorough beating that felt career-altering in the moment, and after taking nearly a year to recover, she had the poor luck of welcoming Jessica Andrade to 115 pounds, which wound up as a one-sided thrashing. After recuperating from that fight, Penne then lost in a flat performance against Danielle Taylor, at which point it looked like the sport had passed her by. That may have been true at the time but never fully got revealed, as Penne instead had her career railroaded by the United States Anti-Doping Agency for the better part of four years. To her credit, Penne put the time off to good use. She is in the best physical form of her career at 39 years old and refocused on the grappling skill that helped bring her to the dance. It remains impressive given her historical issues with stronger fighters that she was able to neutralize Lupita Godinez and scrape out an ugly win, and a subsequent armbar submission of Karolina Kowalkiewicz somehow gave Penne the first winning streak of her UFC career. She got little done in a July bout against Emily Ducote—a reminder that Penne still struggles against consistent and well-rounded athletes—but could easily rebound and stay a going concern against Ricci. A talented grappler, Ricci’s main struggle going forward figures to be that she is likely a natural atomweight. Her UFC debut, a late-notice affair up a weight class against hulking flyweight Manon Fiorot, was a bit comedic in terms of the size difference. However, in fighting opponents closer to her own size in Maria Oliveira and Polyana Viana, “Baby Shark” has impressed thus far behind a persistent game built around her wrestling. Between Ricci’s squat frame and her approach, there is a solid chance this looks a lot like Penne’s fight against Godinez, which was a nip-tuck affair. Godinez got the chance to get in on a lot of takedown attempts, but Penne used her long frame to remain slippery, take her back and make things ugly and razor close. Ricci is not as strong of a wrestler as Godinez, but she is a much more confident grappler, so she could be able to get more done if she finds some wrestling success; and despite her small frame, she does appear physically strong enough to get something done. It likely will not be pretty, but the pick is Ricci via decision.
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