MMA Payout has learned that the UFC 167 Prelims scored an average of 998,000 this past Saturday on FS1. It was the highest prelim rating since it moved to FS1 this past August.
UFC Prelims on FS1
UFC 164 809,000
UFC 165 722,000
UFC 166 628,000
UFC 167 998,000
Average: 789,250
Payout Perspective:
The 998K is a very good rating for the UFC which may reflect interest in the PPV card. It’s the best number since the last UFC Prelims on FX which was 163 in August which scored 1 million viewers. The Prelims featured Donald Cerrone versus Evan Dunham in the last fight on the Prelims. Cerrone looked sharp and eventually submitted Dunham.
These numbers along with the gate and the history of the main event fighters suggest the PPV number should do very well.
Looking at 2012 comparisons….
UFC 154 GSP vs Condit
FX Prelims – 980,000 viewers (strangely one of the lowest prelims of the year)
PPV – 680k buys
UFC 148 Spider vs Chael 2
FX Prelims – 1.8 M
PPV – 925k buys (mmafighting.com)
Looking at their chart, 80% (or so) correlation of prelims translate to PPV buys. The 164 – 167 prelims with this being the biggest, I’d also guess that this will have larger PPV numbers, somewhere in the 700-800 range.
Not impressed with the numbers considering it was the high profile 20th anniversary event and if you take into account that the names on the prelims can actually pull off a fight night event then the numbers are not good IMO. As far as PPV, GSP always does well regardless.
Maaaan, 1.8M for Sonnen-Silva 2? This is just sad. I have no doubt FS1 will eventually get there soon, but still…
It’s 1.8 milion for the prelims for Silva-Sonnen 2 and they were on FX not Fox Sports 1.
Remember these are only prelims, if you watch these and order the PPV, you are looking at 5 hours of watching fights, that’s a long time for anybody to watch a sport, especially one that the casual fans wouldn’t know who half the card were.
Considering these numbers are Prelims and are blowing away the numbers the Fight Nights and TUF are doing by 300-400,000 viewers. I think that these numbers are hugely successful. Fight for the Troops only did just over 600,000. The Belfort vs Henderson card only did 722,000. For the bottom fights of a card that were never shown in the past to blow away entire events specifically for TV with headliners like Vitor and Hendo. Well, there isn’t any other way to look at these except for great numbers.
Even into the TUF era these undercard fights were not shown. People had to hope for quick finishes so the UFC would have time to maybe show 1 or 2 of the fights. IF not they didn’t get seen at all. To think those fights would become a valuable resource for the UFC and their TV partner is crazy. Im sure both sides would take 1 million viewers every time if that had a choice.
1 M viewers is successful for the UFC when it’s on FS1. 1 M Prelim viewers for the UFC, in general – over the past few years – is at the bottom. Simple as that; this is a site focused on MMA, not FS1.
A positive spin is these increased FS1 viewers give the UFC a glimmer of hope by saying fans will come out when they put on the big show. Just like the Sonnen/Shogun fight. The fans exist but need quality over quantity to show up.
I agree with that for the most part. But remember that 1 million for cable TV has always been considered a big success. We have been told this since TUF started. So that number would mean the relation ship between the UFC and its TV partner is pretty safe. The numbers are down from what the UFC has expected in the past, that is true. But even that isn’t an issue for the UFC because it is countered by millions more viewers on FOX and many viewers for many more events than they were doing in the past. If there was less eyes on the UFC overall. It would be cause for concern. But that isn’t the case. They have more eyes on them than ever. These numbers only go to show that the UFC and their ratings on FS1 and FS2 can go really no where but up.
The only downside I believe is it isn’t really growth like im sure the UFC would have preferred when they switched. But I sure they expected it to take time to recover from the cross over. Then with the FX to FS1 cross over that is going to take more time. So their expectations have to be delayed quite a bit.
@duck Of course I know that it’s just for the prelims. I was saying I’m glad this got 1M viewers, but that it’s said that that’s considered a success now. And I have zero idea what your point about watching 5 hrs of programming is. You could say that about ANY PPV prelims.