In 2023, the UFC has faced criticism for its poor treatment of fighters, president Dana White's obsession with his slap fighting league and, most importantly, the watering down of the product – with UFC 289 used as the prime example.

The event, which cost $80 on pay-per-view, took place in Vancouver, BC, Canada on June 11 with a card that featured 11 fights, the bulk of which contained low-to-mid level Canadian talent. Only in the featured bout of Dan Ige vs. Nate Landwehr and co-main event of Charles Oliveira vs. Beneil Dariush were there any important stakes regarding divisional rankings.

Then, in the main event, a women's bantamweight championship bout was booked between Amanda Nunes vs. Julianna Pena, for the third consecutive time. The first at UFC 269 was a shocking upset win for Pena, the rematch at UFC 277 was a one-sided bludgeoning by Nunes and a third was likely to go the same way.

When Pena had to pull out with an injury on May 2, the response was widely positive. Not because of any malice regarding her getting hurt, instead it was at the prospect of novelty at the top of women's 135lbs, and that came in the form of new challenger Irene Aldana.

The Mexican got hot at the right time, thanks to her stunning liver up-kick KO of Macy Chiasson at UFC 279, and her record of 14-6 with only two losses in her last nine also lent her credibility.

A closer look, however, reveals a lot of fool's gold: four of her last five wins came at catchweights of around 140lbs due to either her or her opponent missing weight. That's not possible in a title fight and, perhaps aware she no longer had that extra half-a-weightclass to work with, she walked to the cage looking absolutely terrified, as if she realized what she'd gotten in to.

Immediately she took to a high guard, a boxing stance where the fists are raised above the eyes on either side of the head. Pioneered by boxer Winky Wright and Alistair Overreem in kickboxing, it's designed to keep you protected from barrages and allow you to snap back when the moment arises – and she did that exactly once.

Whether it was the fear implied in her entrance, stage fright at being in a main event, or something else entirely, Aldana covered up with a high guard and did almost nothing else. Any and all offense resembled shadowboxing thrown without any consideration for Nunes' position. Meanwhile, Nunes teed off on Aldana from the opening bell with her notoriously powerful boxing.

Besides for this, Nunes took the challenger down with ease. At first, she let Aldana get back up to keep on pummeling, but by the third round onwards, she was content to dominate on the ground too with jiu-jitsu, ranking up over 4:30 of control time in the five-minute final round.

After 25 minutes, it was clear that this was a total blow-out, with the judges awarding a unanimous decision to champion Amanda Nunes with scores of 50-44, 50-44, 50-43.

As if the most one-sided judging decision on women's MMA history wasn't bad enough, according to ufcstats.com, Nunes landed 142 significant strikes in 25 minutes while Aldana only attempted 143 overall. Of those, only 41 connected, averaging 1.6 per minute.

Immediately post-fight, Nunes took off her gloves and retired.

By stepping away, the women's featherweight division – which had only been defended four times since 2017 – has been shuttered. The trilogy storylines with Julianna Pena and Valentina Shevchenko – both women were in the arena, preempting a face-off – have been prematurely ended. The proposed superfight with former PFL champion Kayla Harrison is no longer on the cards. The women's bantamweight division is without a champ, and Nunes already made four of the top five look like chumps.

The UFC's already bad year is only going to get worse.

[Header: Amanda Nunes removes her gloves and places them on top of her UFC women's bantamweight and featherweight championship belts following her retirement from MMA at UFC 289 at the Rogers Center in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada on June 11, 2023. /Zuffa]