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Versus UFC show from San Diego draws awful ratings
By Zach Arnold | August 3, 2010
UFC on Versus 2 draws 0.86 cable rating
The Sunday shows are not big draws. Plus it’s on Versus, which is a channel that is still on many ‘premium tiers’ on cable companies across the States. Combined with a lack of star power and this is the recipe mixture you end up with.
The good news is that the show was fun to watch, the production values were slick (including the split-screen commercial breaks), and there was some meaningful results to come out of the show.
The other bad PR news story of the day for UFC is this article: Joe Stevenson heads to Mexico
It’s a good article about Joe Stevenson, who has no health insurance (and would need to pay at least $500 a month for it), heading to Mexico for a medical tourism trip to get an MRI done in Tijuana. The issue of medical tourism is nothing new — you hear both the good (cheaper prescription drug prices and MRI testing) and the bad (the horror stories about fly-by-night nightmare cosmetic surgery procedures).
The public outcry for UFC not paying for insurance will be legitimate. At the same time, if they start paying for insurance for all the fighters they have under contract, you’re talking about 150-200 fighters and the costs for insurance would be staggering given the profession they are involved in. Economically, it would be difficult to do. (Which is why I would like to hear how Rob Maysay’s MMAFA, fighter’s association, would tackle this issue given that insurance premiums will continue to skyrocket in cost for the foreseeable future.)
Plus, there’s the whole issue about whether or not UFC paying for full-time insurance would take their independent contractors and essentially convert them into the status of ’employees’ in the eyes of the IRS. Given the debate recently over taxation on higher-end insurance plans, that could put a bullseye right on Zuffa if they had to pay out extremely high premiums for fighters.
(Kid Nate at Bloody Elbow has more discussion on this topic.)
Topics: Media, MMA, UFC, Zach Arnold | 37 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
Can’t give me a link Zack? I’m the one making the outcry about the health insurance issue. you guys tend to blame BE for all the sins of the mma media but never credit us for being willing to be a dissenting voice.
I didn’t read your article. (Sorry.)
I posted an item about this on FB early this morning.
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Fight-Opinion/117394674970456
I’ve added your link to the post.
no one wants to go to your site anyway so the link wouldn’t matter.
As always, a bunch of amateurs (guys like Kid Nate) talking about real issues without doing the real groundwork mentally. The way the laws are set-up, Zuffa’s only real and best option with health care is how they are currently handling it.
First, let’s look at how they ARE handling it.
1. Extensive pre and post fight tests for fighters. All expenses covered by the UFC.
2. Any injuries and hospital bills as a direct result of a UFC fight are paid for by Zuffa.
Now, lets examine what they don’t do. First, here is a link that was posted on The UG about the differences between an Employee and a IC.
http://www.irs.gov/taxtopics/tc762.html
Based on these IRS guidelines, fighters will always be considered IC’s. There just is no way around it. They train on their own. Their training expenses are their own. These athletes just don’t fall under an employee setting. Which means these athletes will also not fall under employee laws.
This means the UFC won’t be setting up retirement plans for them such as pensions or 401(k)’s. It also means that they won’t be setting up insurance plans for them when they not actively working for the UFC.
It’s extremely simple when you get down to the nuts and bolts of it. Zuffa is covering the fighters when they are “on the job”. Which is above and beyond what most other organizations do. They do not cover them during that training process because during that time, they are not really active employees for the company.
And people using the NFL or MLB as a counter, it’s a poor example. Take a MLB athlete for instance. He is under the DIRECT supervision of team physicians and doctors for 9 months a year. He is working every day for 9 months with this team either on their own training facilities or directly in competition. Under those circumstances, of course they would be covered by health insurance. A UFC/WEC fighter is mostly with their team while injuries occur, which falls under the IC catagory.
Plain and simple…. Zuffa does everything in their power to cover their fighters. It is foolish for these fighters to be covered when they are not on the job…. As well as it opens up huge amounts of liability for Zuffa beyond what any internet trolls like Kid Nate are willing to admit.
And as for Joe Stevenson specifically….
1) He made over $250,000 in a year in purse money.
2) He has sponsor money on top of that which should have covered some of his training expenses. Many other training expenses are tax write-offs.
The man, if he spent his money anything but wrecklessly, should have easily been able to pay for insurance premiums for his family.
Stevenson is a deadbeat. He has 2 kids who it sounds like don’t even have insurance, all because he doesn’t want to pay out a portion of his pay towards getting proper health coverage. And the percentage of his pay that would have to go to healh care premiums (due to him being so highly compensated), would be comparable to basically every private sector employee who has to pay some of their own health care costs out of their paycheck.
If I was him, I would be ashamed to admit what he did in public. It puts a negative light on him, not the UFC.
And I would also add the the UFC is NOT doing all that they can to cover their fighters, since they do not cover them 100% of the time while they are under contract.
If a company was really doing “all they can”, then the fighters would be covered 100% of the time while they are under contract/employed by the UFC.
They are covering them 100% of the time while they are actively working for them. Which is during the fight itself.
While they are training, they are not doing so in a UFC sponsored gym. They are doing so at AKA or ATT or Xtreme Couture.
Here is a RADICAL idea. Since they spend all of their time physically at these gyms, shouldn’t their TEAMS be covering them as part of their training expenses?
Let me go a step further in fleshing that idea out.
If a fighter like GSP has a 12 week training camp at Jackson’s and spends $20,000 for that training camp…. Shouldn’t medical insurance be covered in that fee?
Or if a fighter like Condit has a training camp at Jackson’s that costs $5,000…. Shouldn’t medical insurance for that period be covered in that fee?
Jackson’s is who they are paying for the training. Why wouldn’t health insurance in case of an injury by part of that contract? The organization itself has little to do with that transaction.
When they then compete in the UFC or Strikeforce, then injuries occured during the fight itself should then be covered by the UFC or Strikeforce, including medicals and post fight medical costs.
I’m all for fighters being protected, but people love to point fingers at the organizations. When in this case, Zuffa is doing the right thing. It’s the people charging for these camps without any insurance for the fighters to back it up who are the swindlers.
45,
I just get the feeling that if this was Strikeforce or any other promotion, you would jump on them. And rightfully so, I think that they should provide insurance to all of their fighters under contract since those fighters have no other means of making income (fighting) while they under that Zuffa contract.
I think that they only reason you are defending this practice is because the UFC is the one doing it. Not saying that other promotions don’t do it, but you would be bagging them with serious lead bullets for this practice.
Many fighters have other means of making money besides what Zuffa pays. Through advertisers when they fight. They can do training on the side. Income opportunities are there for fighters. Especially ones who have larger exposure on national TV programs.
This has nothing to do with what organizations the fighters are competing in. You keep on falling back on that for every discussion.
This has to do with a very practical idea that fighters do not train under the supervision or in a gym owned by the organization. They train ON THEIR OWN. And by doing so, they incur the costs and risks. It’s the nature of the sport.
While they ARE competing under an organizations (as in the fight itself), they should be covered 100%. Which sadly, most organizations do not.
45, regarding training camps and insurance
Do you get insurance when you work out at a gym you have a membership to? How about when you attend a kickboxing class or when you do aerobics? What about when you work with a personal trainer?
Megacamps like Jackson\’s are not responsible for their client\’s health insurance anymore than a personal trainer is. People pay for the training, nothing else. No camp has the resources to acquire independent health insurance for all of its clients. This is not like working for a business where premiums are bought in bulk and renewed over 6-month periods. No health insurance company is going to agree to automatically cover fighters sight unseen for periods a few weeks to a couple months at a time. This is not remotely realistic.
Except this isn’t a kickboxing class they are taking.
This is a TRAINING CAMP. One typically lead by a head trainer and other skilled assistant coaches who have expertise in a specific area. And it’s being done so for the distinct purpose of getting ready for a MMA contest.
It’s a TEAM atmosphere. Heck, many athletes say they will not fight teammates because of that team element involved. So if these camps want the perks of being treated like teams (as in not fighting each other), then they should operate like real teams and cover their fighters while their train at their facility. Heck, they are covering their own investment because they get paid more the better the athletes do.
“No health insurance company is going to agree to automatically cover fighters sight unseen for periods a few weeks to a couple months at a time. This is not remotely realistic.”
And yet people expect the UFC to cover it’s fighters medical costs year round even when they aren’t training for a UFC fight. People can’t have it both ways.
45, I think you’re making a distinction for people who make fighting their living versus people who go to train in the gym. Although I understand the idea you are getting at, I don’t think it would affect the current state of affairs.
On this occasion (rare though it may be), I happen to agree with what you say about the UFC doing right here, and this being really the only way it can be done at the moment.
What I’m not seeing is how this can legitimately become the responsibility of the team or the gym. The “team atmosphere” you refer to has no relevence to this issue that I can see. Gyms are chosen by the IC. Teams coincide with gyms, and are official organizations, but the fighter’s relationship isn’t that of employee or IC, but more like a membership to a professional organization. Can you clarify for me?
This is only really an issue because most of the MMA audience is 20-40 year old yuppies.
You never hear anyone yapping about this in boxing.
Really who cares? These guys are prize fighters. Nobody put a gun to their head and told them that they had to do this. It’s not like any of these guys are turning down 6-figure jobs w/ full benefits to become prize fighters.
What would Joe “Daddy” Stevenson realistically be doing if he weren’t in MMA? Putting in car stereos or something like that? Tending bar?
Please stop pretending to be smart with the bleeding heart BS.
This is also amateur (at best) reporting by the (juvenile) MMA media. Some dope did an interview w/ Joe and just transcribed everything he said. I bet no follow up questions were asked.
Joe said that he drove down and back to TJ from Victorville, CA. That’s 3.5 hours each way if you’re humming and fly through the border. It’s also gas, a hotel and meals. There is no way that it was cheaper than getting an MRI up here if he went in and paid cash.
I know for a fact he could have gotten the MRI cheaper in Vegas. He just wants to get his name in the news and figures he can because healthcare has been in the news. That’s how stupid most of these guys are and how stupid the MMA media is.
Some idiot wrote an article on Moussasi a few months ago where he said he wanted to fight 8 times this year. It wasn’t asked how do you plan on doing that when your first fight this year is in the middle of April?
Ed. — Aren’t the costs for MRIs for the examination he got around $2,000 or so?
I pretty much agree with you. I mean, I beat the drum that the guys at the top aren’t being paid what they should be, but the idea that anyone should be paying for health insurance for these guys? Sorry. Don’t care. I guarantee you Bob Arum doesn’t buy health insurance for Manny Pacquiao, and he’s worth a hell of a lot more to him than any fighter in the UFC is to it.
Also: We might love Jon Jones, but he isn’t a draw, even after having been exposed to people a hundred different ways. No surprise. He needs to beat a star.
I wonder if even if he beats a star if he can be a huge draw ever. He is a great fighter, but doesn’t have any sort of IT factor. He’s not a badboy like Lesnar. He isn’t somebody I would cheer for like GSP.
I don’t care what station a MMA event is on. I don’t care what the circumstances. IF the average audience is under 1 Million, it’s a complete non-factor.
Not to be contrary here to you 45, but I thought Jones was all “it” factor. From where I am standing, it looks like he is one the most hyped fighters in the UFC right now.
And are saying that this UFC on Versus 2 was a non-factor because it got less than 1 million views? I am not disagreeing with you, just checking for clarification. If that is what you are saying and “dogging” a UFC event for poor ratings, I’ll give you some dap for that since that means that you spread your criticism to all organizations, including the UFC.
On a skill level, he is the next LHW Champion. That is what I raved about before. I think he will dominate the weight class for years.
On a drawing level, there is something about his personality that isn’t overly likable. Sure, he says all the right things, but he just doesn’t have that personality that makes me want to root for him.
In terms of MMA viewership. Yes, if a “free” show does under 1 Million viewers, it is practically irrelevent. This Versus show did right under 1 Million, so maybe at best one could say it was sort of relevent?
Fans make big issues out of what what events did better…. Strikeforce vs. SF Challenger vs. WEC. To me, they all don’t reach a large enough audience to matter. Sure, I enjoy the MMA as a fan, but not enough other people viewed that programming.
I just don’t see how stars can be produced by such small audiences.
And I’m sure people will bring up PPV as having 300,000 buys and so forth. Those shows often get lots of bar fans. Lots of people go over thier friends houses for the shows. Plus, when people pay, they are generally more interested in paying attention to the action. On free TV, you never know how many people are casually watching.
Yes, an MRI in America is $2,000 without insurance. There is no way his cheaper (at least half the price probably) MRI, gas and food (I see no reason why he’d need to stay overnight since the MRI results are instant and he could be treated right then if needed) could total $2,000.
That’s what they bill an insurance company. If you go in and pay with cash it’s way under a grand.
Insurance companies make docs jump through hoops and wait to get paid. Docs over bill insurance companies knowing that they’re going to settle for taking less money.
There are a couple of fighter friendly docs in Vegas that he can go to (unless he’s stiffed them in the past or something, don’t know).
Do you realize that Vegas is actually a longer drive compared to Tijuana for Stevenson?
You actually realize it isn’t, don’t you?
People that mindlessly write snarky crap on the internet really piss me off.
What did you do a google maps search and look at directions?
You don’t drive through a border crossing to go to Vegas, dummy. You can also drive as fast as you can between Barstow and about 20 miles out of Vegas.
The response is simple–respond in a business like fashion, or wait around for a handout that isn’t likely to be forthcoming.
The MMAFA will create millions and millions of dollars in value, with rights fighters already possess. We don’t ask any promotion for anything at all. Approval of the logo would be appreciated (Strikeforce has already granted this approval), but not necessary.
The model used is incredibly simple, and extremely effective. Again, fighters have these rights now, and it takes nothing away from any promotion.
Do you want to be an independent garage sale, or have a piece of ebay? It really is that simple.
Yes, people who bash each other\’s faces for the entertainment of millions, working for a company that is making hundreds of millions of dollars annually in revenue and raking in tens of millions in profit, shouldn\’t be entitled to real health insurance. Because if they weren\’t fighting they\’d probably be doing something else like installing car stereos. That makes perfect sense.
It also makes sense for low-end UFC fighters to have to supplement their income with day jobs instead of training full-time, or for them to risk their health by not paying for proper medical care because they can\’t afford it, increasing the chance that they\’ll be too injured to fight and fucking up Joe Silva\’s booking plans.
Furthermore, I work in retail and even there the full-timers have decent health insurance (and the part-timers have low-end health insurance). If Joe Stevenson was working full-time for the Sears Auto Club installing car stereos, ironically he\’d get mostly reimbursed for any injury sustained on the job or even not on the job. So yes, if he wasn\’t fighting on a global stage, and was instead installing car stereos, there is a good chance he wouldn\’t have to go to Tijuana for X-Rays.
Finally, I\’ve had an MRI and if I hadn\’t had insurance at the time it would have cost me $3000. Stop pretending to know what the hell you\’re talking about. I know _for_a_fact_ that it would be more expensive to get an MRI in Vegas than go down to Mexico for it, even if he did get a cheap hotel room (which 7 hours round trip driving time and a few hours at the destination doesn\’t normally mandate).
If you all had universal health care we wouldn’t even be having this discussion. The idea of not having universal health care scares the shit outta me, and would be one of the main disadvantages of me ever living in the US.
That’s very normal, a lot of American’s coming to Mexico to the dentist, surgery and that stuff. Because here that things are cheap (in some ways), and the doctor’s are ver good.
America is so expensive in this kind of service’s. ¿I dont know why? the same for Plummer’s 🙂
About the Health care system of UFC, i can’t get my opinion, thats because the ¿UFC fighters is employ all the time for sponsor’s and media realted themes, and for the training no?
Joe Stevenson made money for UFC in videogame 100% of the time, he have to protect the company all the time, he can’t speak in the wrong way about Zuffa etc….
But in the other way, at first he sign an contract, and health care, i think, is estipulated on the contract. Not UFC fault.
And Joe have a very big Gym, look at it http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=meJLPImr7b8
The gym absolutely has insurance. All martial arts facilities (probably all gyms period, but I only know about martial arts facilities for certain) have to be covered by insurance since injuries are so common and they don’t want to be sued to the point of bankruptcy. But depending on how he broke his hand is the sticking point. If he was being taken down and caught himself going down on his hands and broke it that way, that is not their fault unless he could prove they told him to do those direct reactions. If he was sparring and broke his hand that way he could make the argument that maybe their glove was faulty or something and have it covered that way. But they could make him take it to court where it would be worth their while to pay legal fees (since their policy could go up) but not worth his (since he could be spending more than $2,000 or whatever he’d pay in ER bills on his lawyers.)
But he really needs a self-insurance policy for such a dangerous job as MMA fighter. I know indy wrestler who make a hell of a lot less than 250K a year who have the insurance so I blame him for this. Should UFC, since they have the money, pay health insurance as a courtesy they can afford? Of course they should. But he is irresponsible for not protecting his family by insuring himself to costly medical bills or a settlement to live on if he is seriously injured. And that fact trumps everything else. So believe it or not I’m mostly backing 45 Huddle on this one.
I don’t know exactly what he had done, but 2 years ago, uninsured, I got an MRI in Milwaukee for $600.
Hospitals and doctors’ offices jack up the costs of MRIs and other procedures because they know that most of the cost will be covered by the insurance companies. If health care costs were set and regulated by the govt like in most other first world countries, these kinds of procedures wouldn’t be so ridiculously expensive.
In re: Joe Stevenson, I dont blame him for going to Mexico; most MRIs I have seen cost in the thousands of dollars before insurance.
In re: Jon Jones, that dude definitely has the it factor. Nobody knows that the UFC is on Versus however. Jon Jones needs to beat a famous fighter on a big pay per view. Then he needs to beat another famous fighter on pay per view, and then he will be a star. As of now he is a star in the making (in terms of being able to draw).
Jones drew less people the second time around than the first. Usually, that’s not how things work if you have “it”.
However, his starpower isn’t going to be known until he beats someone relevant to the fanbase as being a big name star. All the piddly wins in the world won’t matter until then.
It amazing to read so many “fans” who are so quick to drop $50 for a ppv or pay $300 for a ticket to watch the top fighters in the world are even quicker to dismiss any of their complaints. Last year, based on reported payouts, the median fighter purse in the UFC was $18,500. Fighters averaged less than 2 fights each in the UFC. So more than half were making less than $40,000 in payout. Hell, 1 in 5 were making less than $9,000 a purse. That is before training, agents, managers, lawyers, and now insurance expenses. Then take into consideration that the fight game is not a long term profession and you have to start thinking of savings, especially when you dedicated your whole life to training how to fight for our entertainment. Sure there is sponsorship money, but for most fighters, even most UFC fighters, sponsors don’t pay them shit. It’s a myth.
And these are the fighters fighting in the major league of the mma. The NFL of the sport, and most are at the national household median while the owners paid themselves $75 million last year.
I hold no animosity for Dana White or the Fertittas for this, they are running a business and all business at their core are amoral. But I do resent a lot of the fans who seem to revel in the discrepancy of where our fight dollars go.
I’m not going to sit here and act like they’re entitled to great lives because they chose prizefighting as their profession. It’s a job, most jobs suck, and most people struggle financially. Welcome to the real world.
Fighters are independent contractors, like many people I know, and ICs don’t get insurance or retirement plans unless they set it up themselves. As for their pay, the UFC is losing money on the “median” fighters. I’d love to have a job where I made more money than my company did for the work I did.
So, I’m a big fan of Joe Stevenson. Let’s just preface that here.
I also know that he’s pretty successful in the UFC and is making decent money.
He also knows that his chosen career is very demanding physically and has a high chance of him being injured.
Why the fuck isn’t he springing $500 a month for health insurance?
I think the most telling part of the article is this:
“And before that, an overconfident Stevenson thought he simply wouldn’t need coverage and could avoid injury.
“I’m going to have to take full blame for that,” Stevenson joked.”
It sounds like he hasn’t bothered with insurance because he figured he could get by without it. It’s not like he’s a pity case who can’t afford it.
A very rational opinion. Well put.
awful ratings really?, getting around a million viewers on a show with no draws and very little hype on versus sounds like they did just fine to me.
You’re either the world’s worst astroturfer (in that no one takes anything you say seriously because you’re outlandishly over the top for anyone to bother rationally debating with you), or the biggest sycophant ever.
I also thought the split screen breaks were pretty slick.
Much more tolerable than a full traditional commercial break.
Not sure why Rossen seemed to be miffed by them.