UFC Fight Night 59 held on Sunday night on Fox Sports 1 drew an average of 2,751,000 million viewers with a peak of 3,162,000 viewers during the final quarter hour (12:00-12:15 AM ET) of the show according to Nielsen.
The night started off well with the 3 hour prelim show drawing an average of 908,000 viewers making it the second most-watched non-PPV prelims in FS1 history. The peak of the prelims occurred in the final quarter-hour (9:45-10:00 PM ET) with 1,486,000 viewers tuning in. Notably, it went up against the AFC Championship Game between Indianapolis and New England. Of course, that game was a blowout.
In addition, the post-fight Fox Sports Live averaged 1,167,000 viewers from (12:15 AM-1:00 AM ET) making it the most-watched Sunday edition of the program all time.
Overall, it was the third most-watched Sunday in FS1’s history despite it being NFL Championship Sunday.
UFC Fight Night 59 was the highest-rated MMA event on cable TV since TUF 10’s Finale on Spike TV which featured Roy Nelson defeating Brendan Schaub. The card also had Jon Jones’ only loss, a DQ, to Matt Hamill. It also featured a guy by the name of Kimbo Slice.
Payout Perspective:
The big viewership numbers were expected considering the news that it had an overnight rating of 1.7. The great ratings for the day could be attributed to the marketing behind Conor McGregor for the event. It also showed how Fox can help the UFC by promoting its product. Note the cross-promotion of McGregor on FX as well as the many reminders during the NFL playoffs (including the NFC Championship) of the event. The question is how often will Fox want to assist in the promotion of these UFC events.
2.7m? Thats it?
All that promotion didnt really bring in the big ratings.
When Mike Tyson fought Buster Mathis Jr on FOX in 1995, he drew 43m viewers.
September 1979, Holmes and Shavers (with Roberto Duran and Sugar Ray Leonard in separate bouts on the undercard) drew 46 million viewers on NBC.
@ The Greatest those are boxing numbers from its glory days with fewer viewing options. A very average boxing card with a non-title fight from an up and coming young fighter as main event wouldn’t do more than 2.7 millions today either.
Fights on network TV did huge numbers before cable? Then again before the 500 channel universe started and had mike Tyson on it? Shut the fuck up. Nobody cares about your apples to oranges ratings comparison
The only problem is that this is temporary. The McRatings are going to come tumbling down when hype meets reality. Just look at his entire stint in the UFC–Favorable match-ups, not a single decent wrestler. The UFC would do well to keep him away from wrestlers or even rush him against Aldo.
I hate the UFC but these are strong numbers. Talk about an anomoly. “The greatest” is right however Tyson did do 43 million numbers on Fox. Considering tv is more fragmented now and Tyson was a huge star he wouldnt pull those numbers today but a Boxing mega card could still get 25 million. Boxing on NBC will be an apples to apples comparison with the UFC. i expect strong numbers (over 5 million viewers a telecast). Good ratings however for tomatoe can Boxer Dana White.
Good numbers but shows to advertisers people are only tuning in briefly. !5 min peak lol Lets see if the UFC can work with this momentum. Comparing this to epic boxing is laughable not even fair.
Sal you have to be the biggest moron of all the trolls. TV ratings are broken down into 15 minute segments. IF there was more than 1 segment that matched the peak rating then it wouldn’t be a peak now would it? That doesn’t mean the ratings spiked for 15 minutes. Jason never posted information to determain how long a spike was or if there was a spike at all. You need each quarter hour rating to see if ratings gradually rose or not. Considering it started at 1 million viewers and averaged 2.7 million. That shows the ratings had to be over 2.7 million for a very long time to bring the average up.
HAHAHAHA!!! THE GAYEST IS DELUSIONAL!! LOOK AT HIM SQUIRM!!
Boxing comes no where near 2.7m on cable tv. This fight killed it!
HBO/SHOWTIME/ESPN boxing would blow someone for those numbers. Haha.
to “the greatest” and that was at least 15 years ago? im not good at math but correct me if im wrong. LMFAO
Sal got owned once again.
It’s a solid showing considering that FS1 is not a great channel. On the one hand I’m happy for the UFC, on the other, this just encourages Fox to have more UFC cards on FS1 which tends to depress the UFC’s ratings.
This weekend on Fox should do considerably better.
BS you split hairs to make your point. Its laughable! So they get paid for one segment and choke on the rest, Your a fucking moron! Plus they have been chocking on most of the shows! So big deal, they got a good 15 min segment! Once again you and moron boy D run with one aspect and ignore the hundreds and hundreds of bad things! Shows how stupid and simple minded both you paid idiots are. I guess the UFC had their 15 min for the year hahaha Sponsors are laughing at these OVERALL UFC NUMBERS, trust me, only you a D boy are having a party on this!
Sal, you literally ignore every aspect of everything you fucking idiot. Your predictions are always dead wrong. You don’t know basic information about tv/ppv/ or the business of mma and boxing and you spew bullshit on here like an incoherent dementia patient. The UFC is clearly having a rebound year from the injuries and loss of their two biggest stars the year prior. This is how the business cycle works, and if you were doing anything other than working as an usher at the mgm grand, you would be aware of this you stupid moron.
Talking to Sal is like teaching physics to a kindergarten class. Once again. There is not much difference between the peak viewers or any other segment of the broadcast. The 15 minutes before the main card started drew 1.4 million. So that’s about where the ratings start. They peak at the end with 3.1 million. To get a 2.7 average they would have to have spent most of the broadcast close to 3 million viewers. So it was just a good peak. almost any moment during the event there was almost 3 million people watching. Any advertisers who bought time for this event more than likely jazzed their pants as they are expecting about half as many viewers based on recent events.
Once again you have no clue what you are talking about. BTW, The UFC could have had the popcorn vender fight the Hotdog vender on the prelims and it would have had more viewers than anything boxing has done recently.
Boxing on Showtime getting 1.34mil homes out of 22million is better than 2.7mil homes out of over 100mil.
I think boxing on NBC can get over 3mil.
It actually did a couple years ago, Adamek vs Cunningham got around 4mil and the rematch did 3.2mil.
I think Thurman, Guerrero and Broner can do better than that.
NBC is gonna have some great cards later in the year.
D I cant wait to hear your excuses.
THE GAYEST!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Boxing has to buy time to get a network deal! HAHAHAHAHAHA!!! Al Haymon said, “I’ll suck yo dick” to NBC!! HAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
You are wrong The Weakest! Boxing got 1.3 on a network that always has millions watching it at all hours of the day. It is also a network all boxing fans have as it is required to even remotely follow boxing. The UFC did almost 3 million on a network that is a ghost town every minute of the day. There isn’t even 22 million people who know about FS1 let alone watch it. All 22 million know about Showtime because they consciously pay for it specifically each month. That’s why Strikeforce got huge ratings as a minor league promotion on Showtime. It’s because there is always 500,000+ people squating on the channel because of the movies they show and this acts as a strong lead in. Something the UFC doesn’t have on FS1.