Carla Esparza, weight cuts, and a UFC antomweight division

       Former UFC strawweight champion Carla Esparza is one of the many fighters who interacts with fans on social media. Today she shared some interesting information about weight cuts.   

        At least to my eyes, Esparza is in a situation other fighters like Demetrius Johnson and Valentina Shevchenko are familiar with.  When you fight at a weight where you only lose 11to 13 lbs you'll likely be fighting many opponents who are naturally much bigger and use drastic weight cutting methods.  Shevchenko revealed in an interview that she had to eat more often to stay at bantamweight during training camp. 

       On Tuf 20, Carla also says she woke up at 113 for two weeks.

       In a different perspective, Joanna once needed to cut 16 lbs in 14 hours, which tells us that she currently weighed about 131 lb.  Carla also revealed that she walks around between 126 and 128.  This means she walks around 3 to 5 lbs lighter than where Joanna was after a full training camp.

       Despite being at a size disadvantage against nearly all her opponents, Carla has an impressive record. Although she has only lost 4 out of 17 fights, only two of her loses were decisive.  One of course was against the large but elite Joanna.  The other was 8 years ago via armbar against Magumi Fujii.  Her other two loses were by split decision.  This may leave some to wonder how much more dominant she could be at antomweight against fighters her size.

       The same question can be asked about former antomweight champion Michelle Waterson, another seemingly out sized fighter who had to move up to strawweight to join the UFC, and possibly other UFC strawweights.  There may be some exciting stars who would be dominant champions at antomweight, but are unable to display their full potential because of a size disadvantage at strawweight.  Hopefully an antomweight division is already a part of UFC's future plans.  With other possible competitors like Ayaka Hamasaki and Angela Lee, it would likely be one of the most exciting female weight classes.