UFC 117: Payout Perspective

Welcome to another edition of Payout Perspective! This week we’ll be taking a look at UFC 117: Silva vs. Sonnen, which was held Saturday, August 7 from the Oracle Arena in Oakland, California. The stacked event not only featured Silva vs. Sonnen, but Fitch vs. Alves, dos Santos vs. Nelson, and Hughes vs. Almeida.

Silva pulls off triangle in final minutes, defeats Sonnen

Anderson Silva was dominated by Chael Sonnen for much of their 23 minute fight on Saturday, but it was ultimately the last 2 minutes that proved most pivotal as Silva slipped on the triangle and then pulled down on an arm to secure a quick tap.

I try not to indulge in senseless hyperbole, so I’ll just call it an unbelievable comeback. Silva proved his mettle in this fight: getting beat on for four rounds and still having both the capacity and presence of mind to look for the late submission. I’m not sure he won himself a ton of new fans – if anything, probably now more people than ever believe he’s vulnerable – but he did earn back some respect after previous performances.

There’s a debate raging as to whether Sonnen should receive an instant rematch. I’ve heard good arguments on both sides. The pro-rematch crowd argues that an instant rematch needs to happen as soon as possible, because it’s just too good of a business opportunity to risk by delaying. Silva hasn’t been a tremendous draw for the UFC (he averages just 455,000 PPV buys), but a rematch with Sonnen would sell huge. If the UFC decides to book something else, it could lose the appeal and relevance of an immediate rematch. However, the counter argument to a Silva-Sonnen instant rematch is also strong: Silva won without the reffing or judging controversy that usually demands an instant rematch; plus, the UFC likely does not want to set a precedent for handing out instant rematches every time a contender loses a close fight.

My own opinion is that the UFC cannot afford to pass up an immediate Silva-Sonnen rematch for the following reasons:

• Ultimately this business is about putting on fights that people want to see – this is one of them.
• The fight would not require a substantial co-main attraction, which frees up assets for Joe Silva to use to reinforce other cards.
• The winner is surely to emerge with at least a short-term popularity spike that carries forward into other bouts.
• The UFC middleweight division could actually use an extra six months to sort itself out: let Vitor fight the winner of Marquardt vs. Palhares or Bisping vs. Akiyama.

Fitch victorious, but no guarantee of next title shot

Jon Fitch was once again victorious in the Octagon, racking up his fifth win in a row, but the fight also marked the 8th time in a row that he’s gone to a decision. Dana White had commented before the fight that the winner of Fitch vs. Alves would receive a shot at the winner of St-Pierre vs. Koscheck, but all bets were off when Alves came in over weight and even more so when Fitch failed to finish against Alves.

Fitch was good, but not so good that the UFC can’t deny him an immediate shot in favor of someone like Jake Shields. It’s hard to fathom that Joe Silva and the UFC would book St-Pierre in back-to-back title bout rematches with guys he’s already trounced unless they had no other real alternative. The winner of Shields-Kampman could provide that alternative.

dos Santos defeats Nelson, earns shot at winner of Lesnar-Velasquez

Junior dos Santos demonstrated his superb stand-up in the victory over Nelson. It’s difficult to envision another heavyweight being able to match dos Santos on his feet. The fact that he did not knock Nelson out is more a testament to Nelson’s chin and heart than it is to dos Santos’ power. Dos Santos will now face the winner of Lesnar-Velasquez some time in the New Year.

The UFC has done a great job of organizing its heavyweight division and producing never-before-seen depth from the big men. If Lesnar gets through Velasquez and dos Santos, he’ll truly be the top heavyweight in the world. Hopefully that’s something the organization can replicate in the lightweight and middleweight divisions – both of which are kind of in disarray at the moment.

UFC revamps website

MMAPayout.com covered the unveiling of the UFC’s re-designed website last week. After playing around with things for a few days it’s become clear that there are still a few kinks to be worked out functionally. It remains, however, a less cluttered environment than before – one which provides a lot more substance.

Sponsorship Watch

The UFC and Edge Shave Gel ran a contest a few months ago in which the bar code from purchased Edge containers could be used to obtain a free three-month subscription to the UFC Vault. It was good activation for Edge, but something that probably wasn’t advertised as much as it could have been. I’ve been happy to learn over the last month that the Vault subscription is more valuable than access to a select number of fights relevant to the up-coming card; subscribers also have access to recent prelim fights in the days immediately following a UFC event.

The Tequila Cazadores spirit award went to Clay Guida. The UFC is slowly starting to do more with this award, but I really think it’s missing something on the PR end by not getting the story out a little better. It’s got good cause marketing potential; and, with Clay Guida as the most recent recipient, this last one definitely could have had some legs.

I found it interesting that Tequila Cazadores – the presenting sponsor of UFC 117 – had graphics posted during each between-round replay, yet the odd post-fight replay was still brought to us by Bud Light. I wonder if this was a mistake or if Bud Light owns the post-fight replay (finishing sequence) no matter the card.

The Blue Book has been updated.