Michelle Waterson-Gomez looks back at best MMA moments, doesn’t plan to fight again
Esther Lin, Invicta FC
Michelle Waterson-Gomez has plenty to look forward to after authoring a career any fighter would be proud of.
Over the course of her 17-year pro run, Waterson-Gomez headlined UFC events, won an atomweight championship with Invicta FC, and stepped into the cage with a who’s who of the best female fighters in the world. At UFC 303, she announced her retirement following a loss to Gillian Robertson.
Waterson-Gomez, 38, isn’t sure what’s next for her now that her cagefighting days are over, but she’s happy that they are.
“I don’t know,” Waterson-Gomez recently said on The MMA Hour when asked if she will ever fight again. “At the moment, I’m really content with walking away. I’m content with turning the page and taking a step forward into this new chapter. I’m really excited. I’d love to get into acting, I’d love to get into broadcasting. I’d love to be on the other side of it.
“I’d love to coach some of my teammates to greatness. I’d love to be able to help other female athletes, other female businesswomen, other mothers pursue their dreams and whatever it is. I’d love to be able to be in their corner for that. I’m still a brown belt in jiu-jitsu, I want to get my black belt. Whether or not that involves having to compete, we shall see. But at the moment I’m just pretty content with just being mommy.”
The writing was on the wall for Waterson-Gomez to step away from competition, as her loss to Robertson marked her fifth straight setback, a skid dating back to September 2020. Though “The Karate Hottie” regularly went toe-to-toe with the likes of 2024 Hall of Fame inductee Joanna Jedrzejczyk and two-time UFC strawweight champions Carla Esparza and Rose Namajunas, wins over elite competition were few and far between as her career progressed.
One of Waterson-Gomez’s most notable triumphs occurred early in her career when she defeated Jessica Penne in an instant classic in April 2013 to become Invicta’s 115-pound champion. The then-27-year-old battled back and forth with Penne before scoring a dramatic armbar submission in the fourth round.
To this day, she considers it one of her crowning achievements.
“That was the time where I bit down on my mouthpiece and shut the world out and just believed in myself,” Waterson-Gomez said. “I was a 10-to-1 underdog against Jessica Penne and nobody thought that I could win that belt. She was bigger, she was a brown belt in jiu-jitsu at the time, I was a white belt, just had my daughter. Everything was stacked against me, but I knew — I knew in my heart that I was going to win. It didn’t matter how and I didn’t have a specific way how. I just knew that I was going to win.
“It was a war. It was back and forth, and at one point she was on top of me and she was ground-and-pounding me and raining down punches trying to split me open. I just remember looking over at my husband and he was just telling me, ‘Calm down. You’re fine.’ I was able to reverse that position and come out in the next round and finish her by submission. It all came to a head. I was kind of a little bit numb after the ref pulled us apart and I remember standing up and just dropping right back to my knees, thinking about all the hard work that had built up to that moment. So that was a beautiful moment for me, for sure.”
Waterson-Gomez followed the Penne win with another strong performance against Yasuko Tamada — “I was a savage in that fight,” she said — defeating Yamada by third-round TKO to defend her title.
Two fights later, Waterson-Gomez made her UFC debut with a submission of Angela Magana, which set her up for her first UFC main event against Paige VanZant at a show in Sacramento, Calif., in December 2016. She needed less than a round to choke Paige VanZant out.
“I love my fight against Paige VanZant because I was out for about a year and a half going through — I broke my hand in my UFC debut, but it didn’t matter because I won,” Waterson-Gomez said. “After that, it was a series of hand breaks, so it was like, ‘Gosh, I just got signed to the UFC and I keep breaking my hand!’ Every time I got a fight, it was like two weeks getting ready to fight and then my hand would break again, so it was like that for a year and a half. So it went from me getting signed to the UFC, riding this incredible high, to nobody knowing who I was, my hand was broken, maybe I need to stop fighting, I was paying all these medical bills.
“Then I got slated to fight Paige VanZant and then it was the main event at this incredible new stadium, huge opportunity, and that fight just all seemed to fall in line perfectly. They call it the zen flow. Call it whatever you want to call it, that’s what it was for me. Everything was happening in slow motion. I could see her movement, and everything just fell into place how it needed to. I was able to secure the submission, got Performance of the Night, and was able to bring extra money home, which is what meant the most to me because I was out for a year and a half costing my family money. So that fight was also very meaningful to me as well.”
At this moment, Waterson-Gomez has no plans to make any more memories as a competitor, though she expects to be involved with the fight game in some capacity. She prides herself on always making time for MMA fans and doesn’t see why that has to change now that she’s retired.
“Fingers crossed, I’ll be able to be in the back in a different arena,” Waterson-Gomez said. “I’d love to get into broadcasting.
“I’d love to be able to still touch the magic and be a part of the MMA world because there’s nothing like it, but to be able to compete, to be in the locker room, to feel those nerves, to hear the crowd, to have Bruce Buffer scream my name, and to be interviewed by Joe [Rogan]. All those things we take for granted. To be stopped by fans, to be asked to take pictures and autographs, those moments are priceless, and I was just really grateful to have those moments.”
