Dave Meltzer from F4WOnline (subscription) reports on his newsletter that trending patterns for UFC 126 PPV buys are in the range of 700k-750K buys.
The show live drew a sellout of 10,893 paying $3.6 million in the building, and another 1,046 paying $45,100 at the adjacent ballroom for closed-circuit.…Initial buy rate projections based on trending patterns is 700,000 and an independent cable estimate was 750,000 based on very early returns.
Meltzer also goes on to say that internally, Zuffa believed their trending numbers indicated that the event could hit 1 million buys, but points out that it’s still too early to tell due to “wide variations” which typically need a couple of weeks to sort out.
Payout Perspective:
Spike also set a record for the highest prelim ratings with a 1.24 rating with 2 million viewers (UFC 126 Payout Pespective), which is great news considering that Spike TV numbers had been in a low as of late. The previous record was held on a Super Bowl weekend as well, with a 1.2 rating, 1,7 million viewers. As Meltzer states, it appears that there may be some correlation there, where MMA fans will tune in to catch prelims on Spike that night before tuning in to the Super Bowl on Sunday. However, we must point out that although last years Super Bowl show – UFC 109: Relentless – set the prelims record on Spike, it didn’t do a great PPV number with an estimated 275K PPV buys.
The PPV estimate can be taken a few different ways. One is that Anderson Silva has been putting up some very decent numbers as of late (600k PPV buys for UFC 117), though we have to point out that this card was put together in a way where Belfort and Forrest vs Franklin would definitely boost up the number for Silva. It is believed that Anderson Silva will make more than six-figures after his PPV points are tacked on to his reported base pay. The other is that these numbers are on par with what George St. Pierre typically puts up 650K-750K. It is very difficult for the UFC to break the 800k-1 million PPV buys mark on a card that does not feature Brock Lesnar, and GSP is by far the the second biggest star in the UFC. A bout between Anderson Silva vs GSP will most likely do Lesnar numbers, but the negative side-effect of GSP or Silva losing could affect their drawing power in the long run.
Also putting both on one card means one show instead of two.
I was wondering. Does any one know if the UFC shows are still being done in movie theatres or did that quietly go away?
Matt C. – you were close. I figured it would do around 600k.
It’s interesting to note how well recent MMA shows have been doing. The Diaz-Cyborg card sold out and pulled in a higher rating than expected, this card sold out and did a higher PPV than expected, the 1st round of the HWGP is looking like a sellout and will probably do well in ratings. Then we have Penn-Fitch coming up, followed by Hendo-Feijao and Shogun-Jones. Shogun-Jones already has a ton of buzz, and I’m sure the other two cards will hold their own. Bellator will start up soon and now that they have a regular time slot their numbers should improve as well. MMA is off to a great start in 2011.
I was one of those who thought that the industry might be peaking, but it seems like across the board North American MMA promotions are gearing up to set records.
Diego,
I agree. Every big MMA event now, regardless of it being UFC or Strikeforce, trends on Twitter. Strikeforce has been getting great publicity as of late, and numbers all around seem to be going up. Well have to monitor this and see how it goes.
When the year started I did not think that the UFC would be able to show another year over year gain for 2011. After this event and the 42K sellout of tickets in a few hours in Toronto, I’m starting to think they can do it. I was fortunate enough to be able to buy tickets to the Rogers Center before all the scalpers got to them. I figured they would sell out but the when the price of the tickets were revealed I had my doubts. Anyway, the final number will likely be north of 46K after tomorrow’s general public sale. With an average ticket price of say 225$, that would push the gate north of 10 million. Unreal.
Dang I might have missed the mark by just a bit on the 800k but hang on these are still early estimates. So it still might get there. Don’t crush me yet.
No way the final estimates climb to the 1 million mark that UFC put it at though. I’ll settle for 800,001 buys just so I can be right.
I still don’t agree with Melter’s speculation that this is a rebuilding year for UFC on PPV. There may not be any 1 million buy cards this year but I definitely don’t see any cards coming up that look like 109 from last year that only did 275k. I see them going on a good stretch like they did in the middle of last year where they had I believe it was 8 events in a row that never fell below 500k. I would go out on a limb and predict that no event will fall below 500k this year but the very next event might kill that. 127 might fall just short of that 500k mark.