Welcome to another edition of Payout Perspective. This time we take a look at UFC 217 taking place at Madison Square Garden in New York.
GSP Returns to win Middleweight Title
Georges St Pierre looked more muscular than ever before in his foray into the middleweight division against champion Michael Bisping. GSP looked great in the first round but it appeared that he tired. Bisping was able to open him up with elbows from guard despite being taken down. But, Bisping was caught by GSP.
We’ll see what happen next for GSP. He’s not done, but could be in the middleweight division. Of course, that puts Robert Whittaker’s position in the division up in the air. If GSP leaves to face Tyron Woodley in the welterweight division, we could see Whittaker-Bisping.
TJ Dillashaw regains Bantamweight Title from Cody Garbrandt
In a heated fight between two former teammates, TJ Dillashaw regained his bantamweight title from Cody Garbrandt. Cody tagged TJ at the end of the first but it was Dillashaw that got off the shot in an exchange in the second which ended Cody’s night. Dillashaw says there will not be a rematch for now and is setting his targets on Demetrious Johnson.
Thug Rose upsets Boogie Woman
The stare-down at the weigh-ins and Joanna Jedrzejczyk’s proclamation that she was the “Boogie Woman” made me want to see this fight all the more. The contrasts between a stoic Namajunas and the bombastic Joanna Violence led many to wonder if Rose was ready or if she knew something. She knew something as she was able to knock down the strawweight champ twice and with the second make her tap to the strikes. The loss was surprising to most as Jedrzejcyk looked, on paper, to have the overwhelming advantage out of the 3 title fights of the night. Yet, Namajunas was able to outstrike the Muay Thai specialist.
If a loss were to ever be beneficial, this one helps the UFC as they can now set up a rematch between the two which could sell much better as a standalone main event for a future UFC PPV.
Attendance and Gate
Madison Square Garden produced a $6.1 million gate drawing 18,201 fans according to the UFC. The event was the second highest gate in the company’s short history since MMA was legalized in the state. Last year’s UFC 205 drew astronomical numbers with over 20,000 fans and a $17 million gate.
The secondary market was not as robust as last year’s November event, but still did very well. Although tickets dropped during the week, the average resale price was still $538 as of Thursday of fight week.
Bonuses
There were no Fight of the Night bonuses as Performance $50,000 bonuses were given to GSP, Rose Namajunas and TJ DIllashaw. Ovince St. Preux and Ricardo Ramos drew $25,000 bonuses for their performances. St. Preux stopped Corey Anderson with a headkick on the UFC Prelims while Ramos’ spinning back fist gave him the win over Aiman Zahabbi.
(UPDATED) Athlete Outfitting Policy Payouts
With 3 title fights, the Reebok payouts was more than a typical card.
Michael Bisping: $40,000
Georges St-Pierre: $30,000
Cody Garbrandt: $40,000
T.J. Dillashaw: $30,000
Joanna Jedrzejczyk: $40,000
Rose Namajunas: $30,000
Stephen Thompson: $10,000
Jorge Masvidal: $15,000
Paulo Costa: $2,500
def. Johny Hendricks: $20,000
James Vick: $5,000
def. Joseph Duffy: $5,000
Ovince Saint Preux: $15,000
def. Corey Anderson: $5,000
Mark Godbeer: $2,500
def. Walt Harris: $5,000
Randy Brown: $5,000
def. Mickey Gall: $2,500
Curtis Blaydes: $2,500
def. Aleksei Oleinik: $5,000
Ricardo Ramos: $2,500
def. Aiemann Zahabi: $2,500
Promotion of the Fight
Sponsors came out in full force for what many believed to be the biggest event of the year thus far.
Bud Light Canada produced a video and sent it out via twitter with Georges St Pierre
Body Armor, a UFC sponsor, produced bottles of its sports drink with the UFC logo. Kobe Bryant, a part-owner of Body Armor was in town to speak at a Body Armor press conference making the sponsorship official. Cody Garbrandt, Cynthia Calvillo, Francis Ngannou and Michelle Waterson were announced as the UFC’s BodyArmor athletes and a new UFC-geared BodyArmor flavor – Knockout Punch.
BodyArmor formally announced as official sports drink of UFC today, unveiled this co-branded drink as part of partnership. pic.twitter.com/QBJwPTA2rn
— Darren Rovell (@darrenrovell) November 3, 2017
Air Asia was announced as the company’s very first “Official Airline” of the UFC. It covers Asia and Australia so the opportunity for a domestic airline is still there.
EA Sports released the official trailer of the UFC’s next game, UFC 3. It will be released on February 3rd and unveiled some new things to the game. Conor McGregor will make his second appearance on the cover of the UFC video game.
MetroPCS introduced a new commercial featuring Demetrious Johnson.
The UFC provided a video of Cody Garbrandt preparing for his fight and using TriFecta Nutrition. The company, which delivers nutritional meals includes Urijah Faber as a part of the company.
Embedded is starting to tie in the UFC sponsors as the episodes featured more Reebok kits (the fighters looked over their kits which they helped design), Body Armor and mouthguard sponsor GuardLab.
Sponsorships
New official UFC sponsor, Air Asia, made its debut in the Octagon. In addition, MetroPCS, Budweiser, Toyo Tires, Budweiser, Harley Davidson, Performance Inspired, Hospitals for Special Surgery, Wish, Monster Energy and Sheetz shared an Octagon post. Monster also had the center of the Octagon. AMC’s the Walking Dead and EA UFC 3 also were in the Octagon
Budweiser sponsored the Embedded episodes and the fighter prep point.
In addition, Toyo Tires sponsored the post-fight interviews which was on the UFC Facebook page.
Wish sponsored the post-fight interviews in the Octagon. EA Sports UFC sponsored the GSP-Bisping fight.
Odds and Ends
UPDATED: UFC 217 almost made it without a cancelled fight after all fighters made weight. But heavyweight Ion Cutelaba was flagged for an out-of-competition test and his fight was nixed from the card.
The Walt Harris-Mark Godbeer fight was called off after a low-blow followed by a kick to the head. This was the fight that was held over from last PPV after Harris took the Werdum fight. The way it ended, Godbeer probably wishes that the fight did not happen.
James Vick tied Demetrious Johnson with the latest stoppage of a fight with 4:59 in the third round. Vick stopped Joe Duffy as the featured fight on the UFC Prelims on FS1.
Notably, GSP is still sponsored by Under Armour as he wore the clothes while working out on Embedded. Also, some may have noticed the branded mat at TriStar on one of the Embedded episodes.
There were over 1 million searches for “UFC 217” on Saturday which bodes well for the PPV buys. Dana White noted that it was trending to do 1 million PPV buys but nothing has been confirmed. Rose Namajunas had over 200,000 google searches. Cody Garbrandt had 100,000 searches and boxer Deontay Wilder had 100,000.
Conclusion
With over 1 million Google Searches on Saturday for UFC 217 and Rose and Cody getting their own searches, it appears that the return to New York will be a PPV success. I am not sure if the PPV gets to 1 million buys but it will have the best chance of the PPVs this year to hit the mark. Look for this to do a strong 825,000-850,000 PPV buys.
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