Roxanne Modafferi is gearing up for her final battle.
“The Happy Warrior” will soon end a nearly 20-year career fighting some of the toughest and most skilled athletes in women’s MMA history. Modafferi (25-19 MMA, 4-7 UFC), one of the most seasoned and experienced mixed martial artists today, makes her final walk to the cage this Saturday in Houston, where she takes on highly touted unbeaten prospect Casey O’Neill at UFC 271 from Toyota Center.
Modafferi has fought professionally since 2003, with UFC 271 marking her 45th pro bout. If you count her exhibitions during two stints on “The Ultimate Fighter,” make that 50 career fights, a number unmatched by any woman ever.
Modafferi unassumingly has traversed a long road to say the least. And as expected, the battle scars have added up.
“OK, I’m going to be completely honest with you – over this past year, I’ve been starting to feel more affected by blows to the head in training,” Modafferi told MMA Junkie. “You know, like getting hit hard, I used to be able to eat it, and now I’m like, ‘That kind of sucked.’ I’ve had headaches, so I had to just be like, ‘Got to be super careful now.’
“(I) choose my training partners. I dug up my head gear, you know. I just got to be safe with that. So I decided, all right, that was the promise I made to myself: Once I started feeling like anything possible with my brain, I’ll quit. So I’m taking steps now. I can get through another fight camp, but I think it’s about time.”
Apart from health precautions, there are other reasons why Modafferi has decided to retire. At 39, she feels as though the game is passing her by – something many fighters have a difficult time admitting. Also, having dedicated almost two decades of her life to a fighting career, Modafferi believes it’s time to devote her energy into her personal life.
“I feel like these young whippersnappers are coming up and like, I’m still working hard, I’m still trying to get stronger, but I feel like all these young guys are starting to kind of muscle me around a little bit,” Modafferi said. “I was not that happy with my performance in the last several fights. …
“Now I have found the love of my life in (fellow fighter) Chris Roman. So maybe I can think about having a family now. Like, that was never an option before. I’ve been single for like decades, but you know, now I can actually think about that, so yeah.“
BJJ beginnings and Japanese MMA roots
Modafferi’s storied journey in MMA is, in many ways, fascinating and remarkable but also maybe unknown and under-appreciated by the modern MMA fan.
Rolling with the punches, Modafferi somewhat unintentionally became a pioneer and one of the few – maybe the only – females to stand the test of time by fighting through the birth and explosion of women’s MMA.
Modafferi began training judo and jiu-jitsu back in her college days at the University of Massachusetts. She then started to get her feet wet in MMA training at Amherst Athletic Club in Massachusetts.
Roxanne Modafferi got her combat sports start competing in Brazilian jiu-jitsu tournaments. (Photos courtesy of Roxanne Modafferi)
“The girls that I was competing against in the grappling tournaments started debuting and doing MMA,” Modafferi recalled. “And then I saw, like I was really inspired by Robbie Lawler, Aaron Riley and Matt Serra. I was really struck by those guys and was like, ‘I’m going to do this too.’ And basically my goal was to be able to do my jiu-jitsu in MMA and prove that it was awesome and submit people.”
Shortly after graduating with a major in Japanese language and literature and a minor in linguistics, Modafferi moved to Japan for work in the early 2000s. She became an English teacher.
And it was in “The Land of the Rising Sun” that Modafferi’s MMA journey took off.
“When I went to Japan, I told the new sensei there, ‘Hey, I’d like to fight.’ And they’re like, ‘OK, how about in a month?’ I’m like, ‘Oh, really?’ So I fought in Smackgirl. That was my debut in Japan,” Modafferi said.
Well over a decade before Invicta FC came onto the scene, Japanese MMA promotion Smackgirl focused solely on female fighters. It was founded in 2001 and ran until 2008. Modafferi debuted in November 2003, scoring a first-round submission by tapping out Hikaru Shinohara in less than two minutes with an armbar in front of a Tokyo crowd.
Clockwise from top left: Roxanne Modafferi in 2001, 2003 and 2004. (Photos courtesy of Roxanne Modafferi)
From there, Modafferi went on to have plenty of success in the growing but still obscure scene of women’s MMA, which was often ridiculed and nothing compared to today. But that didn’t mean Modafferi wasn’t a force and a serous contender.
Modafferi went 15-5 in her first 20 professional bouts, and she made plenty of noise. During that stretch, she won the Fatal Femmes Fighting lightweight title and successfully defended it against future Invicta FC champion Vanessa Porto with a third-round TKO.
Modafferi also won the one-night, eight-woman K-Grace women’s open-weight tournament where she defeated two opponents before pulling off a major upset against future Strikeforce champion Marloes Coenen, who was 13-1 at the time.
“I won the K-Grace one-night openweight tournament in Japan, and that was really cool,” Modafferi recalled. “I had to fight three women in Japan in one night, openweight, and I won. Yay! That was really awesome. That felt really good. I was very proud of that.”
Roxanne Modafferi during the 2007 K-Grace openweight tournament in Tokyo. (Photos courtesy of Roxanne Modafferi)
Adversity hits
From 2007 to 2010, Modafferi went on an impressive run of 8-1, mostly in Japan, with increasing calls from abroad. It was then that she was given the opportunity to fight for the Strikeforce women’s bantamweight title – arguably the most prestigious belt for women at the time.
However, things didn’t work out for Modafferi as she was knocked out by champion Sarah Kaufman in the third round of their title bout on July 23, 2010. The loss set off a down swing in Modafferi’s career and signaled a changing of eras in MMA, something she had felt coming.
“MMA in Japan started slightly declining and then MMA in America started slightly taking off,” Modafferi said. “In America, people started doing more professional strength conditioning, better body care. Like, the MMA coach existed. There still wasn’t like an MMA coach in Japan.
“So, it started like doing this (shifting powers between Japan and America). Then Heroes and Dream (two MMA organizations) came into Japan; that took the place of Pride FC but not really. So then around 2010, it was really obvious. I started losing all my fights. I had like a massive five-fight losing streak. I was just fighting the top women, but like my training wasn’t sufficient, and I was plateauing. You could tell (there was a shift) because I was being brought back to (to fight in) the States.”
That five-fight losing streak wasn’t easy to endure. However, still a notable and experienced name in women’s MMA, she got the call to compete on Season 18 of “The Ultimate Fighter.” That season, which was coached by Ronda Rousey and Miesha Tate, featured both female coaches and contestants for the first time in the show’s history. It was also the same year (2013) women first competed in the UFC.
Modafferi punched her ticket into the house by defeating Valerie Letourneau but went on to lose to finalist Jessica Rakoczy in the first round of the tournament.
As is the case with many “TUF” seasons, some fighters who fell short in the tournament were given a second chance to get into the UFC by being pitted against each other in the finale. For Modafferi, that meant taking on a tough Raquel Pennington in the opening bout of the main card at The Ultimate Fighter 18 Finale in Las Vegas on Nov. 30, 2013.
Modafferi lost her first official UFC fight by unanimous decision.
Coming to America
Roxanne Modafferi came up just short of winning a UFC title at the TUF 26 Finale.
It was hard to digest as Modafferi now found herself on a six-fight losing streak and out of a contract with her dream promotion. But on the bright side, the loss signaled to her that something needed to change, and she took that seriously.
As soon as TUF 18 came to an end, Modafferi packed her bags and moved back to the U.S. in hopes of reinventing her career. She decided to make a life in Las Vegas and settleed at Syndicate MMA. It was quite different than training in Japan.
“I experienced such a new, crazy way to train in America,” Modafferi said. “I went from doing 300 pushups as conditioning to like being on ‘The Ultimate Fighter’ and seeing ice bathing, I didn’t know about that. And certain other conditioning things I didn’t know about. There was actually an MMA coach. Like, what? There was wrestling.”
With time, Modafferi’s move to the U.S. proved to be beneficial.
Now training like a pro athlete at one of the best MMA gyms in the country, Modafferi dropped down to flyweight and signed with Invicta FC. Her improved striking and athleticism put her back on her winning ways. She went 4-1 in her first five bouts and earned a shot at Jennifer Maia, who held the Invicta FC 125-pound title.
Although Modafferi lost a hard-fought split decision against the champion, she was a winner in many ways. She proved that she could catch up to the ever-evolving sport and hang with the best of them.
From there her story has been well documented.
She won twice more and caught the attention of the UFC for another go at “The Ultimate Fighter 26.” She made it to the final where she fought Nicco Montano for the inaugural UFC women’s flyweight title.
That night in late 2017, Modafferi failed to capture the UFC belt, coming up short in a unanimous decision. However, the crafty veteran did take home a $50,000 bonus for Fight of the Night and a UFC contract, which kicked off a four-year stint in the premiere MMA promotion on the planet.
‘I’m just so happy thinking about it’
At a quick glance, Modafferi’s MMA career might seem underwhelming, but take a deep dive, and you’ll see how impressive it is.
Modafferi fought for major titles in Strikeforce, Invicta FC and the UFC. She managed to stay among the top female fighters for almost 20 years in a sport that ruthlessly leaves athletes behind through its swift evolution. “The Happy Warrior” stood the test of time with positivity, persistence and self believe.
She also notched many notable wins in fights where she often was the betting underdog. Modafferi bested Andrea Lee, Maycee Barber, Antonina Shevchenko, Barb Honchak, Tara LaRosa, DeAnna Bennett, Coenen, Porto, and more.
Looking back at almost two decades of professional fighting, Modafferi is proud of what she was able to accomplish with the cards she was dealt. She lived the dream.
“My goal (was) basically get to the UFC, right?,” Modafferi said. “So I basically achieved my life goal because my life goal was never to be champion because that was not an option. But then when the opportunity presented itself, I was like, ‘Cool, let’s try it.’
“But I really achieved my life goal – fighting in the UFC. I fought like 11 times in the UFC. Like, it’s awesome. I’m just so happy thinking about it. I didn’t win all of them, but I did my best.”
‘The Happy Warrior’ walks away happy – and proud of her work
