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By: Jamie Penick, MMATorch Editor-in-Chief
In Miesha Tate's perfect world, Saturday night will end with Ronda Rousey staring up at the bright lights wondering what's just happened to her.
"I just keep picturing in slow motion, me landing that one knock out punch," Tate said in an interview with MMAFighting.com (transcribed by Yahoo! Sports' Cagewriter). "And her just falling and the ref just stopping it before I can even get another punch in. Just like, 'she's done! She's done! Don't hurt her anymore.' (smiles) Yeah, I just want to win by brutality."
UFC 168 is the culmination of almost two years of emotions for Tate, dating back to the night she lost her Strikeforce Title. This time around, she says she's expecting the best version of the UFC Champion, and that's the woman she wants to defeat.
"I'm expecting her to be hell on wheels. I'm expecting the best Ronda Rousey anybody's ever seen," she said. "I know for sure she doesn't want to lose her title and I know for damned sure she doesn't want to lose it to me."
"So, I think that she's going to put on the best fight and I'm going to put on the best fight and I want that. I want to be able to say that I beat the best Ronda Rousey."
Penick's Analysis: Tate's got a major hurdle to jump over in this fight. We've seen what's happened in this matchup before with a Rousey who hadn't fully reached her potential as a fighter. It's entirely possible she's still yet to reach her full potential as a fighter, and Tate has to contend with further improvement from Rousey on top of the fact that she's already suffered that loss once. She's remained confident the entirety of the last six months, though, and deserves credit for not backing down from the massive challenge in front of her.
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Jamie Penick, editor-in-chief
(mmatorcheditor@gmail.com)
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