Pat Barry: Joanna Jedrzejczyk is ‘f*cking herself’ by not accepting losses to Rose Namajunas

Joanna Jedrzejczyk recently explained why she -- and not Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) Strawweight champion Rose Namajunas — is the real division queen, despite losing to “Thug Rose” in consecutive bouts.

According to Rose’s partner and coach Pat Barry, “JJ” is not doing herself any favors by not accepting defeat, saying that she isn’t getting better because she fails to accept the losses and learn from them.

“I think that Joanna is f*cking herself over by not accepting defeat,” Barry told MMA Fighting at Thursday’s UFC 227 media day. “That’s why she lost to Valentina three times. Lost the first time, she got robbed. Lost the second time, she got robbed. Lost the third time. Knockout to Rose, wasn’t her fault. Lost a decision, wasn’t her fault. She wants to fight Rose again. She’s not going to be able to. It’s still going to be Rose,” he added.

Rose initially knocked Joanna out at UFC 217 last year (see it), only to defeat her her five months later via unanimous decision in an instant rematch. Still, despite both losses, Joanna — for whatever reason — refuses to give Rose her props.

“You can grow from losing. If you’re not going to grow from that, how are you going to get better? It’s not her fault that anything ever went wrong in her life. It’s everyone else’s fault but hers,” said Barry.

“Honestly, as good as Joanna is — she’s a f*cking fantastic athlete, she’s a dominant athlete, one of the best female fighters to ever live, ever — if she accepted the responsibility for it, how much better would she get? How much better would she be if she accepted it, worked on making some changes? How much better would she be? But she’s been so dominant for so long, I don’t think she’s going to make any changes.”

Joanna has declared she won’t accept any other rematch unless it a title fight, and is willing to wait for Rose to do her thing in order to make it happen. Still, given the fact that Namajunas has schooled her twice, a trilogy fight really doesn’t make all that much sense at the moment.

Still, Pat says the champ will beat her again if that’s what it has to be.

“No, we know Rose is a better fighter,” Barry said. “She beat her twice. There’s no discussion. There’s no discussion. If Joanna is the better fighter, she’d be the champ right now. But she’s not. Rose is. She knocked her out, and then she beat her ass for five rounds,” he said.

“Rose wants to fight whoever’s the best. If Joanna is the second best or the next best whoever it is, Rose wants to fight the best. Whoever’s out there. But is she entertaining the idea of fighting Joanna again? Sure, if that’s what comes around. Been there, done that.”

Namajunas is currently taking time off to recover from injuries, while Joanna got back onto the winning track last Saturday (July 28, 2018) by defeating Tecia Torres at UFC on FOX 30. As for her requests for a third fight against Namajunas, that may be tough to come by as the winner of the upcoming fight between Jessica Andrade and Karolina Kowalkiewicz at UFC 228 could have a leg up on the title shot.