The question of the crossover of interest between pro wrestling and mixed martial arts has always been a hotly debated topic, usually with both sides claiming one has nothing to do with the other for obvious reasons.
Pro wrestling companies, the WWE in particular, don't want to invite any comparison with UFC, for fear it looks like they have competition. Plus, in some venues, like pay-per-view, if it was competition, than they were losing ground to competition for years. Plus, they werent able to garner similar ad prices or television rights or charge close to the same ticket prices even with being an established entertainment form and with better ratings.
For obvious reasons, UFC wants no link with pro wrestling, because one is sport and the other is athletic theater.
Still, UFC's original audience in 2005 came from the pro wrestling audience that watched the WWE's flagship program, Raw, in particular the 18-34 male demographic that stuck around in huge numbers to watch The Ultimate Fighter reality show, and purchased the second Randy Couture vs. Chuck Liddell fight on pay-per-view. Since then, UFC has more than thrived on its own, but one of UFC's biggest stars in history, many would argue its biggest drawing card, Brock Lesnar, walked into UFC as a huge star based on his exposure as one of the WWE's biggest stars. And, after becoming UFC heavyweight champion, Lesnar is a significantly bigger drawing card as a pro wrestler now as former UFC star, than he was from 2002 to 2004 when WWE promoted him as one of its biggest stars.
UFC was, however, once it had its audience on Spike, able to draw on its own after WWE left Spike in the fall of 2005.
The latest bit of evidence comes in the form of Bellator ratings. Bellator in its first season on Spike TV averaged 809,000 viewers, airing directly after TNA Impact on Thursday nights at 10 p.m.
On 6/19, in its first show on Spike TV not to have a pro wrestling lead-in, the show from Thackerville, OK, headlined by "King" Mo Lawal, one of the company's best known fighters, beating former Kimbo-killer Seth Petruzelli, did a 0.4 rating and 480,000 viewers from 8-10 p.m., down 41 percent from the spring season average. The show did a 0.4 in the Male 18-34 demo, and 0.6 in the Male 35-49 demo.
The debut of Fightmaster, Bellator's new reality show starring coaches Frank Shamrock, Randy Couture, Joe Warren and Greg Jackson, did 432,000 viewers from 10-11 p.m. Neither show cracked the top 100 in the 18-49 demographic for Wednesday.
Spike officials were quick to put the blame on the Chicago Blackhawks 6-5 overtime win over the Boston Bruins in the Stanley Cup playoffs. That game did 6.64 million viewers, a number that is exceptional for the NHL.
"A lot of hockey fans are MMA fans, and that's 6.5 million viewers, a few hundred thousand were guys that we were counting on, and that's what we attribute the low numbers to," said David Schwarz, Spike TV's Senior Vice President of Communications. "We took a big hit with the hockey game."
One of the reasons both shows were put on Wednesday to debut was to avoid the possibility of going against the seventh game of the NBA championship series, on Thursday. It is very possible even with the TNA lead-in, the show would have done worse, given the NBAs audience.
Fightmaster, which got generally strong reviews, only did a 0.5 in the target Male 35-49 age group and a terrible 0.3 in Males 18-34. Ultimate Fighter on Spike routinely did 1.5 or better in the Male 18-34 demographic, which was usually its prime audience.
How valid that excuse is will be obvious when it doesnt go against hockey in upcoming weeks. Spike replayed the first episode the next night at both 8 p.m. and 11 p.m., both before and after Impact, to try and reach the wrestling audience. The show did 302,000 viewers at 8 p.m. the next day for a replay, well below the level of repeated UFC programming. At 11 p.m., the show replayed again after Impact and did 267,000 viewers, a number which sounds bad, but it was against the fourth quarter of the seventh game of the NBA playoffs for a show that had aired multiple times over the previous two days. It should be noted that TNA did not promote either the replay feed coming on next, nor the show itself airing a second first-run episode the next Wednesday.
"For reality shows, it takes time for people to find it," said Schwarz. "We're optimistic we'll see the numbers go up. We went head-to-head with a monster game that did a huge number."
Bellator's next live event, 7/31 in Albuquerque, which features two championship fights and three of the company's four biggest stars, is arguably the strongest lineup in company history.
The show has Michael Chandler, the company's lightweight champion, defending against David "Caveman" Rickels, and welterweight champion Ben Askren defending against Andrey Koreshkov. In addition, Lawal faces Jacob Noe in the summer light heavyweight tournament final, and Ryan Martinez faces Vitaly Minakov in the heavyweight tournament final. Both tournament winners will be getting title shots.
"We're optimistic about July 31," said Schwarz. "We've got a big card. We think it'll do better."
By all rights with such a loaded show, it should do significantly better. But with that kind of a lineup, doing less than probably 800,000 viewers for such a big show would be an indication of how much Bellator needs the wrestling audience for a normal show. Bellator programming will be moving to Friday nights in September.
Whatever chance there was of a Benson Henderson vs. Anthony Pettis rematch on 8/31 in Milwaukee went out the window when Pettis knee was examined by UFC doctors and they told him he needed to be rehabbing it for six weeks before getting back to training. That wouldnt give him enough time to be in peak shape for 8/31.
In what will almost have to be his last UFC fight without a win, the one-time legend Norifumi Kid Yamamoto returns on 9/21 in Toronto to face Ivan Menjivar. It will have been 19 months since Yamamoto, now 36, has fought in UFC, due to injury issues. Until suffering a torn ACL in late 2007, Yamamoto had a 17-1 record. He was Japans biggest drawing card, as a great wrestler who became a good kickboxer. While maybe 5-foot-3, he fought most of his career at 155, even though his walk-around weight was 141. He even fought to a no contest once with Josh Thomson, who was gigantic next to him. When lighter weight classes came in, the feeling was hed dominate. But injuries started catching up to him, both the knee and a dislocated elbow suffered when he left MMA to pursue his fathers dream of an Olympic wrestling medal (he failed to make the Japanese team). Kid was popular because his father wrestled for Japan in the 1972 Olympics and later became a national coach, and his two older sisters, Seiko and Miyu, were both very pretty girls who were world champions at wrestling, almost like if Gina Carano had a sister and both sisters were world champions type of deal. Miyu also married Enson Inoue, a Hawaiian who was one of Japans early MMA stars, and Inoue helped take Kid from wrestling into all-around fighting. On December 31, 2004, Kid vs. Masato in a kickboxing match did a 31.6 rating, still the second most watched New Years Eve fight (behind Bob Sapp vs. Akebono) in the history of that tradition. While Kid lost, he did knockdown the much bigger Masato, and the Japanese saw both as winners. From there, he was the first MMA fighter to get mainstream endorsements and was Japans biggest MMA star until the Japanese scene collapsed. But hes gone 1-5 since his injuries and 0-3 in UFC, and this has to be his last chance, and they obviously have not given him an opponent that is easy, as Menjivar is currently ranked No. 10 in the bantamweight division. Im not sure what happened but Yamamoto at one point was going to cut to 125 for his last shot in UFC.
UFC has commissioned a documentary that would likely be out toward the end of this year on the 20-year history of the promotion.
Rousey did an interview last week regarding the filming of the show, which is currently going on, saying, Now that were halfway through the show, I can say that a lot more interesting things have come up with Miesha than would have with Cat (Zingano, who was the original choice as coach before tearing her ACL and needing surgery just before the show was to be filmed). So yes, I think a lot of people were right about the drama aspect being better. Last week, Dana White described the filming by saying, Its going exactly the way youd expect it to be going. Bad. Im dead serious. Miesha and Ronda hate each other. Its literally crazy drama every day. Its irritating. I dont even know if some of he stuff will make TV. Its bad. Those two do not like each other, and their camps dont like each other. And its just pure f***ing mayhem every day. Rousey also said, I dont need this show. I already have my options. But I want the division to work and want it to keep going without me there. I think this show is the best way to increase the depth of the womens division and get attention to the womens division and get to know that there are good fighters there. People dont know who they are. Im doing this show more in the interest of the division than to really accomplish very much personally. Given all the offers she has, its going to be interesting to see how long Rousey stays in the sport.
As of this past weekend, there have been 176 UFC fights in 2013. Of those, 88 have had finishes and 88 have gone to the judges. Thats not all that shocking since the finishing rate of right around 50% has been pretty consistent since 2010. In 2005, when UFC first hit television, it was 75%, and even as late as 2008, it was 68%. The change in percentage coincides with the percentage of fighters in smaller weight classes, which as a general rule, are more likely to go do the judges.
A new MMA movie is scheduled out this summer called Tapped, which was filmed in Toronto and Anderson Silva and Lyoto Machida are in it. The trailer is out, and both are in it. The storyline is that, A disgruntled teenager, sent to do community service at a rundown karate school, enters an MMA tournament to face the man that killed his parents. .
A new MMA movie is scheduled out this summer called Tapped, which was filmed in Toronto and Anderson Silva and Lyoto Machida are in it. The trailer is out, and both are in it. The storyline is that, A disgruntled teenager, sent to do community service at a rundown karate school, enters an MMA tournament to face the man that killed his parents. .
A new MMA movie is scheduled out this summer called Tapped, which was filmed in Toronto and Anderson Silva and Lyoto Machida are in it. The trailer is out, and both are in it. The storyline is that, A disgruntled teenager, sent to do community service at a rundown karate school, enters an MMA tournament to face the man that killed his parents. .