The Athletic reports that Saturday’s UFC 251 PPV drew 1.3 million viewers making it the best drawing pay-per-view since UFC 229 which featured the showdown between Khabib Nurmagemdov and Conor McGregor.
UFC 251 featured Kamaru Usman taking on last-minute replacement Jorge Masvidal. It also featured two other championship title fights in Petr Yan claiming the vacant UFC bantamweight title over Jose Aldo and Alexander Volkanowski successfully defending his UFC lightweight title by split decision over Max Holloway.
The initial main event of Gilbert Burns and Usman fell through after Burns tested positive for COVID-19. However, Masvidal agreed to step in and Usman granted the last-minute replacement challenge. Usman easily earned the victory over Masvidal using his superior wrestling skills.
UFC 229 took place in October 2018 and was one of the most anticipated fights that year with bitter rivals McGregor and Nurmagomedov going at it. Also, on that co-main event, Tony Ferguson stopped Anthony Pettis. The buy rate for that event was reported at 2.4M.
Saturday’s event differed from UFC 229, as the main event was put together in less than a week. However, it did feature a brewing rivalry between Usman and Masvidal.
Payout Perspective:
The 1.3 million PPV buy rate comes without an actual gate which could have pushed this event even higher in terms of revenue for the UFC. The reported buy rate shows the ascendancy of Masvidal’s star as you can argue that the buzz for this didn’t occur until Gamebred’s involvement. Notably, you may infer from the interviews that Masvidal is receiving a portion of the PPV upside as part of his deal to come in on short notice. This would be ideal for him considering the reported buy rate. The lack of live events coupled with the buzz for Fight Island and Masvidal likely helped with the buy rate which White had indicated was trending well even before the event took place.