It would appear as though Ozzy Osbourne may be set to follow in Megadeath’s footsteps as he’s reportedly agreed to play, live, at Affliction 2: Day of Reckoning in Las Vegas on October 11th.
Undoubtedly, Ozzy Osbourne is a talented musician with a significant fan base in most parts of the world; but in an MMA industry where most promotions are struggling mightly with increasing fighter costs and rising production expenses, are the benefits to bringing in an over-the-hill music act really going to outweigh the costs?
If you break down Affliction’s promotional revenue streams, their greatest hope for growth (and breaking even) is within their PPV sales. The last event registered anywhere from 65,000 to 100,000 buys which is well-below the UFCs 2008 average of nearly 450,000. Yet, Affliction’s live-gate was quite decent as they sold-out the card and grossed nearly $2 million (although Steve Cofield of Yahoo! Sports reported that nearly $500,000 in seats were purchased and comped).
If Affliction expects to compete, head-to-head, with the UFC – and, certainly, it appears that way given their purse structure – then they must sell more PPVs. And let’s face it: Osbourne value in terms of additional PPV sales is extremely questionable.
We’ve seen in recent days and months the financial instability of MMA organizations such as ProElite and the IFL, it remains to be seen whether or not Affliction is going to be any better off in six months from now.
Certainly, for an organization that lost anywhere from $2-4 million on its last event – with arguably the most stacked heavyweight card ever – you’d think that cost management might need to come into play sooner rather than later.