Why Holly Holm is happy Ronda Rousey doesn't think she can handle being champ

LOS ANGELES -- Last week, UFC women's bantamweight champion Ronda Rousey claimed that her UFC 193 opponent, Holly Holm, would enjoy the life of a contender more than the one the champion lives.

"I don't think she'd be comfortable with it," Rousey said about the idea of Holm as champion. "I think it would take away from her quality of life, to be honest. It's a skill I'm still learning."

For her part, Holm who has already experienced life as a mutli-time world boxing titleholder, was happy to hear those words come out of Rousey's mouth.

The way Holm sees it, if Rousey is talking about what life would be like for Holm as champion, then the idea that Holm can win the Nov. 14 bout in Melbourne, Australia, is already in her head.

"If she thinks about, if she's basically saying ‘if I win,' then she's got that thought in her head already, so that's awesome," Holm said at a Monday media event.  "So she's saying with a win that I won't be able to handle it, but with a win I'll be able to handle anything. That's what I care about. That's the bottom line."

Many were surprised when Holm (9-0) got the nod against Rousey (12-0) at this stage of her career, since general consensus was that Holm was a potential future contender who was still a couple fights away from being ready for a title shot. But Holm says she's not going to rushing into a quick mistake and loss, the way several other of Rousey's opponents have.

"I don't want to go into the fight thinking, ‘she's going to come out with this, so I'm going to throw this,'" Holm said. "A fight is unpredictable. that's why people love to watch fights. You don't know what's going to happen. So, I want to go in with kind of an open-ended plan and be able to adjust along the way."