UFC Retains PPV Crown

Dave Meltzer of Yahoo Sports! has written a good summary piece detailing last year’s PPV figures across MMA, boxing, and wrestling in which the UFC claimed six of the top ten buyrates and eleven of the top fifteen.

UFC’s numbers are even more impressive when one considers that several of the company’s biggest drawing cards missed most of the second half of the year for various reasons.

 

Heavyweight champion Brock Lesnar fought only once in 2009, since he was sidelined with an illness eventually diagnosed as Diverticulitis. But Lesnar stayed on his perch as the king of PPV, headlining the year’s biggest event, UFC 100, which drew 1.6 million buys. Lesnar’s win over Frank Mir trailed only three events in PPV history, all boxing matches: the 2007 Oscar De La Hoya vs. Floyd Mayweather fight, and Mike Tyson’s 2002 match with Lennox Lewis and 1997 fight with Evander Holyfield.

 

Welterweight champion Georges St. Pierre, who appears to be the company’s second-biggest draw, also didn’t fight after July due to an abductor muscle tear in his victory over Thiago Alves. Middleweight champion Anderson Silva didn’t right after Aug. 8 due to elbow surgery. And what was expected to be the company’s biggest fight of the second half of 2009, a Quinton Jackson-Rashad Evans grudge match built off “The Ultimate Fighter” reality show, won’t be taking place until May due to Jackson getting the part of B.A. Baracus in “The A-Team” movie which was being filmed at the end of this past year.

Payout Perspective:

The next six months will likely define whether the UFC is able to match its company record of nearly 8 million PPV buys and defend its crown as the top PPV earning organization in North America:

• There will be four titles put on the line between March 27th and May 8th
• The Ultimate Fighter debuts on March 31st
• UFC Undisputed 2010 is set for a new on May 25th
• The UFC’s second annual expo will be held over Memorial Day Weekend
• Liddell and Ortiz will meet in June (possibly on the same card as Couture-Franklin)
• Brock Lesnar will likely return in July

The influence of momentum is fairly well supported by the buyrate information we have, which means UFC 111 could be one of the more important events for MMA this year. If the UFC can pull people to 111 it’s very likely the calibre of that show will be enough to persuade many of those fans to buy UFC 112 and really build some momentum for a stellar line-up in May and June.

Don’t forget the WEC on April 24th, either; the amount of success the UFC has in late March will directly impact the “UFC Presents WEC 48: Aldo vs. Faber.”

Note: The entire list can be viewed within the rest of the article, but not surprisingly it was UFC 100 that claimed the number one spot; followed by Pacquiao-Cotto, Mayweather-Marquez, UFC 94, and UFC 101, respectively.