From a Spike TV-issued press release today:
“The Ultimate Fighting Championship proved yet again to be the ratings champion with the hard-to-reach demographic of young men. Spike TV’s telecast of a live ‘UFC Fight Night’ on Saturday, July 19 (9:00pm-12:00am ET) featuring the best pound-for-pound fighter in the world, Anderson Silva, out-delivered every other channel (broadcast and cable) with Men 18-34 (903,000), Men 18-49 (1,550,000), Men 25-34 (622,000), and Persons 18-34 (1,326,000).* The telecast peaked at 11:30pm for the Silva vs. James Irvin bout drawing 3.8 million viewers and a staggering 4.9 rating for Men 25-34 and a 4.1 rating in Men 18-34.
The UFC fight card also drew more viewers than FOX’s coverage of MLB (3,072,000) earlier in the day and nearly tripled its reach of Men 18-34 (369,000) and doubled the Men 18-49 (879,000).
Overall, the three-hour live UFC event averaged a 2.1 household rating, a 2.8 with Men 18-49, a 3.2 with Men 18-34, a 2.0 with P18-49 and 3.1 million total viewers. Comparing to other marquee weekend events, Spike’s UFC telecast also drew more Men 18-49 than ESPN’s coverage of “The ESPY Awards” (1,127,000) and Men 18-34 (689,000).
Compared to the time period a year ago, the ‘UFC Fight Night’ was up +229% in household rating, +451% in M18-49, +463% in M18-34, +470% in M25-34 and +266% in average audience.”
More on this in a bit.
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Just a quick comment for you guys all saying Fedor got robbed as far as pay! Tim got 800,000 to show and would have gotten 200,000 to win. It was widely reported, Fedor got 2 million to show. The gate doesn’t cover the main event, and ppv buys won’t cover Michael Buffer’s expenses (around 300,000). They needed 250,000 ppv buys to break even according to mmaplayground. No event other than UFC has gone over 100,000. I’m not wishing them to fail, but predictable boring fights=failure!!
Hate on me if you want, but Tito Ortiz may save them! No matter how much you hate him, he’s a 10x bigger draw than Fedor will ever be! Not opinion, fact! Thats why he was one of only a handful of guys to get a % of ppv buys!
how can you say fact, maybe now that more people have seen fedor and tito has been declining for yrs he will grow to be a bigger draw, so it is your opinion and not fact.
it is? tito sold the biggest ppv ever, fedor in 2 ppv’s didn’t do 50,000. so FACT my friend. you can’t market a non english speaking fighter. Spider is barely marletable, and I’m sure gets way less sponsors than someone of less ability that speaks english
its not fact because they are still fighting and things can change and the sport is growing so more fans more numbners, hopefully people saw how good fedor is and will want to see everyone of his fights, so its your opinion.
But would the casual fan pay $40 to see Fedor? I doubt it.
maybe not yet pat, and i agree with your tito comment on the other thread it would help them but once word gets around and more people see fedor and get into mma and not just the ufc things might change.
I think Affliction have just overpaid their fighters ad not thought things through properly, but you never know! They may be thinking long term, over a year or so of events, and just hiding from us general public.
Please check out this vid and give some comments
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tvrjeg6_HQE
no, it is not a rickroll lol
Ortiz will be a good draw, with a worthy opponent, but Ortiz will pick the opponent… who will he pick that he can beat, and still will be a draw?
I don’t know what Frank Shamrock’s contract obligations are like with elite, but that would be a good draw for fans.
there was a thread about a deal in the makings @ elitexc. fshammy vs tito, end of ‘09. both fighters are up for it.
i think he’d pound on rizzo maybe. HAHA! not sure if rizzo is famous enough for tito to accept a fight with though.
I want to see Tito get destroyed by Rogerio Nogueira in Affliction!
lol.. or ricardo arona, where the hell has he been?
Yeah, its about someone signs arona so I can see him back in action!
I’m not saying I like it (regarding Tito, that is), but Kevin is bang on here. Tito has grown to celebrity status with the Dana whining, Apprentice appearance, and a very business savvy multi-millionaire girlfriend. He is not trying to hang on to the past on some minor-league MMA circuit. He is here to stay.
‘Will ever be’ is the future tense Kevin… i.e. opinion.
will ever be?? really???? ….is that because you are an excellent candidate into reading the future??? well, just like the people that were saying FEDOR fights “cans” changed their opinion very quickly after this fight, in time maybe you will also. You cant make such a bogus claim like that after witnessing fedors 1st and only fight under affliction(give it time my son) FEDOR was a huge draw in asia and he will also be one here, actually he already is by the numbers alone. i was there live and you should have seen all the people going nuts for fedor alone!!!!
That doesn’t sound good for the amout of PPV buys Affliction received. Considering I think I read only around 20% of homes have a DVR/TIVO, if that. I personally did not buy it due to economic issues, but that doesn’t mean I will not buy the second show.
you didn’t miss much buddy. You’re in CA right, next time come to my place watch it on the 60″
BNF, AA saved that card. I kinda regret getting it, and I get everything in HD so it was $50. next time I’ll just catch in on the net.
That’s what I did. Sucks to watch it on the net, but from what I understand my 50″ wouldn’t have been that much better. If they get Randy/Fedor for the next one that will be very hard to pass up.
that doesn’t surprise anybody.. ufc is the real deal.
Impressive. Lets hope the UFC can use the knowledge from this promotional blitz to hype up their other free cards.
Does everyone think that the UFC will have a free event on Spike every time Affliction has a PPV?
maybe, they realize that no one (except for a few people) would purchase 2 ppv’s in a night. But 3 million viewers compared to less than 50,000 for affliction just proves my point. While the best HW in the world, Fedor is not a draw outside the hardcore fans.
**Hey stinky, got an extra ticket to elite this week end? I’m one of the few that believes your rich, prove it to me, take me to the event!! lol!
Stinky IS rich… it’s no secret. The way he flaunts his bets.
No offense Stinkman, I would do the same… one day.
that havn’t put out the ppv buys yet kevin, but of course you already think you know them.
man, roy. they will do more than 25k, don’t worry…but they still didn’t cover the cost of the main event and buffer.
do you want to change your name now or wait to we hear the results, you already know the numbners right.just remember it kevin doesn’t know sh*t will be your new name
why don’t you go to sleep kevin and quit typin, that’s what you posted down the page.
id jump into this argument but i think talking to my wall would make more sense than reasoning with “kevin”
yea. i think so, and it doesn’t bother me at all. genius business move by the UFC. everybody was hating on Dana for competing for viewers, but those million viewers in each demographic (like me) was thinking real hard about ordering the Affliction card, but I didn’t because spider was on spike for free. $40 saved is $40 earned for me. i ain’t rich. booyashabooyaka! cha-ching! HAHA!
maybe Affliction will backfire at UFC with a free event while UFC will air on ppv on the same day.
ROFLMAO!!! Sure, they’d do that, if they want to fast-track to bankruptcy.
I want a promotion to compete with the UFC that can withstand Dana’s cock-blocks. Such a company would to first and foremost be profitable. Tell me, what about their first PPV would make you think that their viewership will grow? Most of the ppl that bought the PPV were hardcore fans, namely those who regularly visit the popular MMA websites. The viewers were satisfied for the most part, but there are not a lot of ppl that wished they would have bought the PPV. That’s the dynamic that Affliction is missing. UFC grew b/c it became the “it” thing with the young male demographic. More people started to buy UFC PPV’s b/c they didn’t to be missing out. MMA is not yet mainstream, UFC is. Unless someone can start a Pride 2.0 in the States (minus the mob connections and pro wrestling roots), the UFC will keep dominating the market.
it depends on how highly anticipated the fight card will be, the more anticipated the card gets, the more viewers it will get and that goes both for UFC/Affliction. if Affliction throws an highly anticipated event for free while UFC airs on PPV which is also highly anticipated event then viewers will likely will watch Affliction because it’s free but if both will air on PPV, UFC will likely draw more viewers than Affliction. i don’t think Affliction will ever throw a freebie because they’re just getting started and still got a long way to go.
No, what affliction needs to do is get rid of the ring and its amateur production and convert to a cage and HD and I’ll get it. Without that, they won’t being seeing a nickel of my money
Ant: i wanted Affliction to do that too but 8 sided cage cost much more money than traditional ring (maybe about 150k – 300k just my guess who knows)and also hooking up hd and brighter lights too. Trump as billionaire, he might get a cage and some upgrades someday hopefully.
They could just put on a PPV and kill affliction. If they co main evented a BJ (say versus K-flo) and a chuck (vs forrest) fight for afflictions next event then most people would only buy one PPV. Which do you think would sell best?
chuck vs forrest would sell more.
nap time, thanks a lot mania for getting my comments up, I truly appreciate it!
MAYBE @ FIRST, BUT DOUBT IT IF AFFLICTION CATCHES ON. I BOUGHT IT FOR TWO REASONS. 1) I WANTED TO SUPPORT AFFLICTION BECAUSE I’M A MMA FAN FIRST AND A UFC FAN 2ND. THE BETTER AFFLICTION DOES THAN THE MORE FREE SHOWS WE THE FANS GET. 2) I WANTED TO SEE FEDOR BEET THE $HIT OUT OF BIG BORING TIMMY! AND ALL THAT CRAP ABOUT IT BEING FIXED IS JUST ANNOYING. WHY WOULD THEY NEED TO FIX A FIGHT WTH “FEDOR” IN IT? PEOPLE WILL BE SAYING “FIXED” “FIXED” “FIXED” AS LONG AS SPORTS ARE AROUND. DON’T HATE THE HATERS, INSTEAD FEEL BAD FOR THEM BECAUSE THEY MUST HAVE OTHER DEEPER INSECURITY ISSUES GOING ON. AND IF THEY THINK THAT ALL OF THESE FIGHTS ARE FIXED THEN WHY ARE THEY STILL WATCHING?
Your caps lock is on
dude, if its so annoying, why are you still talking about it when nobody else is? if you’re such a big mma fan, why don’t you make a statement about the fights itself?
I agree , if Affliction does better the fans reap the benefits. However, it’s up to them to put on a great fights with a great production. I’m not going to keep sinking money into that hole unless it rapidly improves. I’d pay for Coutre vs Fedor, but outside of that I don’t know. I’m not all that willing to pay for another amaturish excuse of a production.
You don’t have to yell at us…
87% of statistics are made up on the spot
I think we can make that work.
only 50% of the time
LOL! Nice.
Fans lose big if Affliction succeeds. It splits the best fighters and makes match-ups impossible.
no fans win if they succeed we get free events more stacked cards and everyone cross promotes accept ufc, down the rode if these oother orgs make it the ufc will have no choice but to cross promote, i would love it if there where one org that all the best fighters fought in but its unrealistic the ufc can’t and won’t hire every great fighter.
it will take no less then 5 years to have this kind of scenario.
Yes they can, the only division that’s not stacked is the Heavy Weight. It’s like the MLB, if you can’t make it in the big leagues then you play in the minors. EVERYBODY knows the UFC is the “big league”, if you don’t get a contract then you’ll just fight in the minors.
no they can’t mike, some do to the fighters like some of the great japanese fighters have no desire to fight here and some do to dana not wanting the best fighters because of personal beefs, if the ufc hires all the best fighters than i am for it, but be realistic they are not going to.
Maybe UFC will buy out Affliction like they did Pride and then they’ll own the WORLDDDD
it would be great but they would have much from buying affliction since most of those fighters where borrowed from other org or signed one fight deals.
I honestly think that in long term it won’t be about a promotions willingness to put fighters together, but the fighter’s willingness themselves.
In boxing fighters duck each other to keep a good record, MMA doesn’t have that problem because UFC picks the matchups between top, top guys.
Actually, they have a different problem. Top guys ducking friends that they train with or subsequently unwilling to go up to different weight classes cuz their buddies fight there. It’s too bad. Because a guy like GSP should move up to 185 to challenge Silva (but won’t cuz of Marquadt) and Silva should challenge Griffin at 205 (but won’t cuz of Machida).
Tito was a big draw but not any more. he happend to be on two good cards in his last two fghts so i got stuck watching him. he cant save affliction.
He is a huge draw. A PPV with him and Fedor Vs Randy would do great numbers. But in actual fact, the biggest PPV draw heavyweight is Brock!
I actually think Kimbo is the biggest HW draw, it’s bullsh&$.
Don’t mention kimbo and MMA is the same sentence please.
I will. But, I make sure I add “it’s bullsh&$.” at the end of each of those sentences.
A ppv with randy vs fedor will be huge without him. putting him on will just make his big head bigger. wandy, jardine, bj, lyoto, t silva, the hope of seeing soku is why i paid for ill will.
Duh, it was free. Of course, they would be “impressive”.
Ill will was on ppv
Also who would tito fight to make it a big draw? mike whitehead? babalu? babalu is not a big enough name neither is whitehead. tito is now to the point where he needs a big name to be a big draw. he was a big draw but he is not anymore. its 08 not 02 or 04 times changed.
As mentioned previously: lil Nog would be appropriate. Babalu would be descent, he has a bigger name than most. Especially in Affliction.
Tito can’t draw flies anymore. Babalu would be ok.. but who really wants to see that.. let alone pay for it.
Rob Dib
http://www.break-your-face.com
babalu would smoke tito… submission 1st or 2nd round