Holly Holm’s head coach, Mike Winkeljohn, had more than one reason to be frustrated with the outcome of Holm’s latest outing in the Octagon. Her split decision loss to Ketlen Vieira was one thing, but he feels that it derailed Holly’s chance to cross over into boxing and take on one of women’s boxing’s all time greats: Ireland’s Katie Taylor.
With Taylor fresh off the back of headlining Madison Square Garden, Winkeljohn elaborated on what he called “the biggest women’s boxing fight of all time” in an interview with BJPenn.com.
Mike Winkeljon: Holm vs Taylor Would Be “the biggest women’s boxing fight of all time”
“I know Holly wants to go back to boxing. It’s never easy to transition back but Holly had world titles at 140, 147, and 154, nobody has ever done that before. Holly was the best of all time in boxing and now boxing at 135, she’s never been there before.
I know Holly has power and would knockout Katie Taylor so it would be great. With that being said, it’s all about MMA right now.” In fact, he saw a Holm-Taylor fight being even bigger than Katie Taylor’s outing against Amanda Serrano.
“I think it would be a huge fight, gigantic, I think the biggest women’s boxing fight of all time.” In fact, Winkeljohn’s plan was to defeat Vieira, challenge Amanda Nunes for the title, and move over to boxing afterward.
“Holly is a special person and is someone that always wants to fight. She is taking this week off to get her head around what just happened but she’ll be back, it’s simple as that. We have had some injuries in camp, and over the last couple of years.
Holly will fight at bantamweight or featherweight, she just wants to fight. Really, whenever the UFC can get her a fight she will get back in there but I think she’ll be in there by the end of the summer.
I know she really wants the UFC title, badly. She wants Nunes again, in her mind she wants Amanda to win the rematch [against Julianna Pena] so they can run it back. She knows she made a mistake in that fight and she wants to climb that ladder again.”
As Holly Holm enters the twilight years of her stellar career, Winkeljohn can’t help but be frustrated with how this last fight transpired.
“What a great way to end her career and all that got taken away from now at least from some guys watching something else.” Do you think Holly Holm could knock out Katie Taylor? Let us know in the comments.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ah0DmgebIVA
