The event was on at freaking MIDNIGHT, and it got a 2.5% rating. Why is this so nightmarish? It was on, after all, at MIDNIGHT on a non-holiday weekend.

It seems like it really wouldn’t matter what the ratings were. They had almost zero PR for the event and it wasn’t headlined with fantastic fights at all. With that in account, I would have expected a 2.5 – 3.0%. Comparing these numbers with past shows is absurd considering some of the past shows have had better matchups and more drawing fighters.

This all seems like a huge stretch to me.

Ed. — In the 1980s, pro-wrestling aired in ‘golden time’ on TV-Asahi and All Japan had a good slot on Nippon TV. In the early 1990s, the shows were pushed into time slots on networks of anywhere from Midnight to 2 AM (late Sat. or late Sun., depending on the network). If the promotion weren’t drawing 4’s or 5’s or 6’s then they would have been axed. Programming in recent years got low in the high 2’s/low 3’s and that’s a danger zone, but recently New Japan — the only player left in wrestling on TV — got their show back up in the 4’s. DREAM being relegated to Midnight on TBS shows how little the network cares about the organization at this point and the low rating pretty much cements that point. The old chicken and the egg phrase comes to mind here.

Yes, you’re right it was lucky sub, the same goes with Nog vs. CC, Nog vs. Sylvia, Nog vs. Sapp, I guess Mir vs. Lesnar and hundreads of fights

I guess HW division with Sylvias, Lesnars, Nelsons, Monsons, Rothwells, Werdums and Gonzagas in Top 20 has more depth in your mind.

IMO only LW division has more talented fighters than featherweight and it’s obvious cause most people in the world ,who are in shape, weight around 70-80 kg (with weight cutting it’s about 65-75)

““Ken was taking legal over-the-counter products, and based upon our preliminary research, I’m investigating if those products were the result of these findings,” Donohoo told Sherdog.com on Wednesday.”

““Ken is willing to submit to immediate testing in Sacramento to prove his innocence,” said Donohoo.

As for this whole Dream ratings issue….while MMA’s popularity is certainly waning in Japan, using Dream7 as an example of that is like shooting fish in a barrel.

It was a FEATHERWEIGHT tournament that aired at 1AM on a sunday night. Featherweights? Most people have never even seen a featherweight MMA fight…even in Japan’s mainstream. I mean, come on. Its like kicking a dead dog.

DREAM’s Tournament is more like a Bantamweight Tournament.

British FC… Have yet to hear one thing about their tournament.

Brown was easily beating Imanari until he got caught in the submission. And since getting his leg wrecked in that fight, he has some back like a whole new fighter. I doubt Brown would lose a rematch.

In terms of depth of the Featherweight Division…. There is the WEC and Sengoku right now. That’s about it.

This year we will have four FW tourneys (Dream, Sengoku, Bellator and British FC) with over 50 fighters involved and there is also stacked WEC division, Shooto with Inoue, Nakamura, Sato.

Compare it to HW or LHW, outside UFC and Affliction how many interesing fighter are there?

Even in WW Dream and Sengoku are doing only 8-man GPs, so saying that FW division is lacking depth sounds ridiculous to me.

Surely people must accept that the fact the Dream show got a such bad tv slot is a sign that the interest in dream is low. MMA in Japan is no big thing anymore and its been that way for a while. Dream is just another long list of promotions in Japan all fighting to survive. As in the past promotions have come and gone. There has always been a cycle where different promotions at one time of another become ‘hot’ and then it moves to someone else. However at the moment it seems there is no promotion puro or mma) in the fight business over there that has real momentum. As a New Japan fan i’m real happy with how they are going as they were at rock bottom not so long ago and slowly but surely are going in the right direction. Noah will always have some real good matches but the booking for 2 years now has been a mess. I suppose the aim now is to slowly build Kobashi up again for another title run but thats months and months away.

I think Zach may be right about New Japan bringing back Muto to hold the IWGP belt for the past year–he drew crowds and ratings, and it gave Tanahashi time to recover from injuries. He and Nakamura can now focus on a heated rivalry that will take the company into the future.

NOAH did the same with Kensuke Sasaki holding their belt for a time. NOAH’s problem as I see it is their roster–about half of it is old guys who can no longer go stiff, and so there’s too many “light hearted” comedy matches.

As for DREAM: I think they may be making a mistake in building around just one fighter. But the problem across the board is where I’m going–I think there’s too many different organizations, with some talent running thin. Some of these companies I think are gonna have to fold, or merge. That could be a business decision that some have to take, considering the economic situation worldwide.

No kidding, Einstein. But I think the division is lacking depth, and Imanari and Maeda have never really impressed me.