Joanna Jedrzejczyk retires from MMA following UFC 275
Joanna Jedrzejczyk has had a truly remarkable, legendary combat sports career, spanning back to a start in kickboxing and Muay Thai well over a decade ago.
After going 37-3 as an amateur, claiming a number of championships along the way, she’d turn professional, going 27-3, where she’d lay claim to a number of other, more prestigious championships.
What Jedrzejczyk is most well-known for however is her mixed martial arts career, where she had one of the most dominant title reigns of all-time.
Coming to the UFC with a record of 6-0 back in 2014 (also going 2-0 in amateur MMA), she’d win her first two bouts before dethroning inaugural champion, and current champion Carla Esparza via TKO in round two.
A total of five dominant title defenses would follow over the likes of Jessica Penne (TKO), Valerie Letourneau (UD), Claudia Gadelha (UD) in their rematch, Karolina Kowalkiewicz (UD) in their rematch, and future, now former champion Jessica Andrade (UD).
This win streak, which was improved to 14-straight with her defeat over Andrade, was surprisingly halted at UFC 217 against Rose Namajunas (TKO). A second-straight defeat to Namajunas (UD) would follow just six months later.
Jedrzejczyk returned to defeat Tecia Torres (UD) three months following, before moving up to 125 lbs later on in 2018 to challenge for the inaugural belt there, losing a unanimous decision to current champion Valentina Shevchenko.
Jedrzejczyk would come back nearly a year later to defeat Michelle Waterson (UD), before her back-to-back fights with Weili Zhang.
The first of which went down in March of 2020 at UFC 248, where Zhang defended her UFC strawweight championship against Jedrzejczyk via split decision after a Fight of the Year winning effort.
That was such an incredibly close fight that really could’ve gone either way. And if you haven’t seen it, we strongly suggest you go back and give it a watch.
The next went down over two years later, on June 11, 2022, at UFC 275.
After a tough first round, which saw Jedrzejczyk get pummeled by Zhang who was reigning down vicious shots from on top, the Polish legend was KO’d in the second round with a vicious spinning back fist.
After a long layoff, to return against a fellow former champion that’d been active, it was an incredible showcase of women’s MMA to say the least.
Thank you Joanna Jedrzejczyk for your illustrious career, it was certainly a great one to watch.
The Polish former champion retires at 34 years of age with a mixed martial arts record of 16-5, and a complete combat sports record of 80-11.
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