Another potential star in the strawweight division. Bec Rawlings has a distinctive look and personality, and you could easily push her as one of the faces of the division. Hopefully she stands out at The Ultimate Fighter 20, where she'll be fighting for a chance to be the first-ever UFC women's strawweight champion, but either way, the UFC needs to push her. Here's why: one of the failings of the promotion has been pushing only champions, and not building up contenders enough (unless they're Chael Sonnen, and he does all the promotion himself, it's not like the UFC ever had to do much to promote him). As a result, you rarely expect much from title challengers these days unless there's legit heat between them - i.e. Jones vs. Cormier. However, for every Bones/D.C. beef, there's a Mighty Mouse vs. Bagautinov, which left most fans asking "who?" when it came to the challenger or looking it up on Wikipedia. Same with T.J. Dillashaw - and he shocked everyone by defeating the hitherto unstoppable Renan Barao earlier this year. With the strawweight division, the UFC has a chance to really promote not just a champ but a number of challengers. Here's to hoping Rawlings is one, and names like Torres and Herrig wouldn't hurt either.
Primarily covering the sport of MMA from Ontario, Canada, Jay Anderson has been writing for various publications covering sports, technology, and pop culture since 2001. Jay holds an Honours Bachelor of Arts degree in English from the University of Guelph, and a Certificate in Leadership Skills from Humber College.
