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NCRadioMan · 02-02-2010, 10:31 PM

Strikeforce, UFC draw big TV numbers
By Dave Meltzer

The television head-to-head battle on Saturday night between UFC and Strikeforce turned out to be a win on both sides.

Strikeforce’s live event on Saturday night from Sunrise, Fla., largely built around the mixed martial arts debut of football legend Herschel Walker, drew 517,000 viewers. It is the second-most viewers for an MMA event on Showtime, trailing only the 571,000 viewers on Aug. 15 for the Gina Carano vs. Cris “Cyborg” Santos fight.

As is usually the case when Strikeforce has a major event, UFC countered on Spike TV with the cable debut of a taped major event, in this case airing the Dec. 12 UFC 107 show, headlined by B.J. Penn vs. Diego Sanchez and Frank Mir vs. Cheick Kongo.

That show had a 1.64 rating and 2.2 million viewers. It would be the second-highest rated for a replay of a UFC PPV event in history. Most UFC PPV replays put against a Showtime event are in the 1.2 rating range.

This trailed only the 1.7 rating that a replay of the UFC 91 show, headlined by Randy Couture vs. Brock Lesnar, did. Even though it was taped, it was the most watched television show on cable on Saturday among men in Spike’s key demographics, males 18-34 and males 18-49.

The show drew more viewers than many UFC live events on the station, including beating all but one live Fight Night special in the last 17 months. The show peaked with 2.5 million viewers for the Mir vs. Kongo fight at about 11:45 p.m.

Sounds like UFC trounced SF..........however:

A huge reason the UFC got more viewers was because Showtime is a premium cable channel with 12 million subscribers, while Spike is in nearly 98.6million homes. So if you compare numbers Strikeforce actually outperformed the UFC by a ratio of 4.3/2.2 or about 2:1 if you put the numbers to scale based on actual viewership vs. potential viewership. 4.3% of Showtimes potential viewership watched Strikeforce while 2.2% of Spikes potential viewership watched UFC. These are rough numbers, but you get idea of how they performed against eachother.

02-02-2010, 10:31 PM	#1185
NCRadioMan Chutney Lovebusciut Join Date: Oct 2008 First Name: Chutney Location: On the shores of Loch Shiel Posts: 4,281 Trading: (66)	Re: Official MMA Thread Strikeforce, UFC draw big TV numbers By Dave Meltzer The television head-to-head battle on Saturday night between UFC and Strikeforce turned out to be a win on both sides. Strikeforce’s live event on Saturday night from Sunrise, Fla., largely built around the mixed martial arts debut of football legend Herschel Walker, drew 517,000 viewers. It is the second-most viewers for an MMA event on Showtime, trailing only the 571,000 viewers on Aug. 15 for the Gina Carano vs. Cris “Cyborg” Santos fight. As is usually the case when Strikeforce has a major event, UFC countered on Spike TV with the cable debut of a taped major event, in this case airing the Dec. 12 UFC 107 show, headlined by B.J. Penn vs. Diego Sanchez and Frank Mir vs. Cheick Kongo. That show had a 1.64 rating and 2.2 million viewers. It would be the second-highest rated for a replay of a UFC PPV event in history. Most UFC PPV replays put against a Showtime event are in the 1.2 rating range. This trailed only the 1.7 rating that a replay of the UFC 91 show, headlined by Randy Couture vs. Brock Lesnar, did. Even though it was taped, it was the most watched television show on cable on Saturday among men in Spike’s key demographics, males 18-34 and males 18-49. The show drew more viewers than many UFC live events on the station, including beating all but one live Fight Night special in the last 17 months. The show peaked with 2.5 million viewers for the Mir vs. Kongo fight at about 11:45 p.m. Sounds like UFC trounced SF..........however: A huge reason the UFC got more viewers was because Showtime is a premium cable channel with 12 million subscribers, while Spike is in nearly 98.6million homes. So if you compare numbers Strikeforce actually outperformed the UFC by a ratio of 4.3/2.2 or about 2:1 if you put the numbers to scale based on actual viewership vs. potential viewership. 4.3% of Showtimes potential viewership watched Strikeforce while 2.2% of Spikes potential viewership watched UFC. These are rough numbers, but you get idea of how they performed against eachother. __________________ The path to loyalty is trust.