MMARising.com: Since the battle with Hashi, you have been one of a number of talented female fighters who has not received another opportunity to fight. Given that you have competed among the best – and are still ranked among the best – what do you feel that you need to do in order to attract attention from promoters of larger MMA shows today?

Amanda: That’s a good question and, unfortunately, I’m not really sure what the answer is. Without being able to fight, it’s difficult to attract attention. Outside of posting photos of myself on the Internet wearing nothing but MMA gloves, which is obviously not going to happen, I’m not really sure where to go from here.

I’ve been growing my hair out for a while now, which should at least help. The short hair was always an issue regarding marketability. I didn’t grow it out because of that, but it won’t hurt. I guess that I’d ask any fans out there that would like to see me fight again to contact Strikeforce and voice this to them.

MMARising.com: Fans and fighters seem to be split fairly evenly as to whether Gina Carano’s presence in MMA is good or bad for the women’s division. On the one hand, she brings added exposure to the division, but questions have arisen as to whether this really benefits any other fighters besides her. Gina herself has repeatedly stated that she wishes that the spotlight was shone on the entire division, rather than just her alone. What is your take on this and do you feel that she helps or hurts the women’s division as a whole?

Amanda: That’s a really tough one. From everything that I’ve ever seen of Gina, she seems like a great person and I think that she’s a very talented fighter. I guess my litmus test for her effect on the women’s division is how many women are fighting and being promoted. As of right now, this is probably the time period when I’ve seen the most inactivity among the upper-level female fighters since I started in MMA.

That is not her fault, but at the same time, I’m not sure how you could say that there’s been this great leap forward for women’s MMA. Cyborg made a nice payday and that was due to Gina, and Gina made more for one fight than pretty much all other women have ever made combined, so that was good for her but I haven’t seen much trickle down.

I think that a lot of this comes back to the promoters. Gina is really a special case, and I’m not sure when there will be another combination of beauty, skill, sex appeal and the willingness to exploit these attributes.

However, there are a lot of girls that have more skill than Gina, have great personalities and are attractive, but until the promoters put forth the effort to get these girls some exposure, nobody will really know or care who they are. There could be a lot of stars in the female divisions, but the promoters have to do their part.

MMARising.com: If you were given a rematch with any opponent who had previously defeated you – especially Tara LaRosa – do you feel that you would come out on top in each fight?

Amanda: Absolutely, without a doubt. The only one that I would leave off of that list is Jen Howe because she’s my friend and I don’t think about fighting her like that anymore.

MMARising.com: Who are some top female fighters today that you would most like to compete against?

Amanda: Roxanne Modafferi, Sarah Kaufman, Kaitlin Young, Tara LaRosa, Takayo Hashi, Rosi Sexton, Tonya Evinger, Vanessa Porto and Miesha Tate, just to name a few. I’d love to fight Megumi Fujii, but I’d have to cut off a limb to do that.

MMARising.com: Besides simply getting a fight, what are your main goals for the coming year and which promotion would you most like to compete for next?

Amanda: I’m set on Strikeforce because that’s where the best fighters are. Unless other promotions pop up or the WEC starts having women fight, Strikeforce is pretty much the only show in town. When it’s been so hard to get a fight, it’s tough to set goals outside of actually getting back in the ring.

There are skills that I’m trying to get better at, so I’m staying focused on that because it’s something that I can actually control. I had the goal of getting my Black Belt in BJJ and that happened in July. That has been at least one high point during this period of inactivity.