By If you met Steven Gonzalez at his day job working as a loan officer at a local bank you would never think he was the mastermind behind one of the largest Instagram accounts devoted fully to women’s mixed martial arts in the whole world. And yet, that’s exactly what Gonzalez does in his free time as he runs the @MMAChicksRule account, which boasts over 10,000 followers and has posted nearly 4,000 pictures of female mixed martial artists at weigh-ins, professional photo shoots and beach vacations.
“A lot of MMA fans don’t pay attention to women’s MMA and that makes me sad,” Gonzalez said of his account. “If these guys just gave the women a fair chance they’d see that they are just as capable as any male fighter, and that’s why I decided to make this account, to show guys that WMMA is worth following, too.”
Gonzalez also makes sure to comment on posts by fighters that he can’t use, like fight and training photos, telling them how beautiful they are so that those less-interesting posts still get engagement. It’s not easy work, with Gonzalez devoting several hours a night to checking the accounts of hundreds of female fighters’ social media profiles for pictures to rip or posts to share to the account’s story. At the end of the day, though, he knows it’s all worth it when you’re doing something for the greater good like bringing attention to underappreciated athletes.
