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Thursday headlines

By Zach Arnold | November 30, 2006

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The IFL announces a lot of shows for 2007, and we find out the latest information on boxing PPV buyrates.

  1. Fight Report: The IFL’s big 2007 live events schedule
  2. Miami Herald: Ultimate Fighter tryouts in Hollywood on Friday
  3. Yahoo PR: Details on Open Casting call for TUF 5
  4. CTV (Canada): Nova Scotia cage fight to allow controversial elbow hits
  5. BoDog: Second season for BodogFight announced in St. Petersburg, Russia
  6. Bout Review (Japanese): Fedor will appear at the BoDog 12/2 Vancouver event
  7. Fight Report: Pacquiao vs. Morales 3 does 350,000 PPV buys

Topics: All Topics, Media, MMA, Zach Arnold | 15 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |

15 Responses to “Thursday headlines”

  1. Mr. Roadblock says:

    It shocks me that HBO is happy w/ 350,000 buys for Pac/Morales. That was an incredible trilogy. Up there with Ali/Frazier, Holyfield/Bowe, Gatti/Ward and I think better than Barrera/Morales. That fight should have had boxing fans going nuts for it. I understand they guys are lower weights, but still that’s some of the most exciting fighting you’ll ever see. That fight should have done double the business it did on PPV. Boxing has become horse racing. A once proud sport that now only survives on a hardcore level because of poor promotion. I think HBO should be ashamed of the half assed job they are doing as boxing’s modern day steward.

  2. badape says:

    Today’s Most Incompetent Post: “Haha!! I think this is very bad for Pride (Pride’s PPV buys). There are also rumors that Pride is trying to sell themselves to anyone willing to buy…” Posted by Rashad>Forrest (nice tag, dunce) at http://www.sherdog.com. Appeared online 11-30-2006, 11:31 AM.

  3. JThue says:

    75,000 is higher than TNA Wrestling is doing, even for their recent VERY succesful PPV’s, and TNA has one mill weekly viewers on Spike. Regardless of what PRIDE were expecting, it’s a number that shows there is some solid potential if “only” they can get on TV.

  4. KennyP says:

    75,000 ppv buys may be higher than TNA draws (by 50-100% on average).

    But PRIDE’s production costs are MANY multiples higher than TNA. Even if the NSAC-relased fighter salaries are accurate (and I doubt those numbers to be a complete accounting), they constructed a “big Japanese fight” arena atmosphere that likely ran several million dollars. Plus they needed to contract US production staff and transport them to Vegas.

    TNA, by contrast, airs (almost) every PPV from a dedicated Orlando soundstage that already has the on-air “set” constructed and wired. The production staff is largely local and already under contract. They tape 2-3 weeks of TV the night after the PPV (to save on additional airfare/travel costs). And most of the on-air talent earns less ANNUALLY performing at TNA events than Fedor earned for that ONE NIGHT. (Even TNA’s top-paid workers like Angle and Sting still make less in 2 months than Fedor made in Vegas).

    TNA’s on-air (and live) product looks minor-league compared to WWE. And downright bush league compared to PRIDE. But it is far less expensive project to produce. And it’s now a (near) breakeven project on a monthly basis. Unlike PRIDE, which is still burdened with significant obligations that no longer make $en$e given the lack of Japanese TV yen.

  5. The UFC PPV doubling the number of boxing PPV buys should be the sports story of 2006. I’m not talking about just combat sports. I’m talking about the entire sports world. This is a complete changing of the guard, with facts completely backing this up.

  6. JOSH says:

    Has the Hughes/GSP numbers been confirmed yet as factual?

  7. Ivan Trembow says:

    People are missing the story about the Pacquiao vs. Morales fight. The first two Pacquiao vs. Morales fights drew 335,000 to 350,000 PPV buys, and the question going into the third fight was how much its buyrate would suffer, given the fact that it was going head-to-head with a UFC PPV airing simultaneously.

    HBO PPV executives had said publicly that they didn’t think they would lose a single buy as a result of going head-to-head with the UFC, because they draw from different fan bases. It seemed unlikely that HBO’s prediction would be accurate.

    As it turns out, they were right about the buyrate not falling off. The third fight drew just as well as the first two, even though UFC 65 was airing at the same time.

    Also, once again, the “700,000 buys for UFC 63” information is not reliable. Even Meltzer qualified it in three different ways, including coming out right out and saying “this is not from a source that I would say is confirmation.” However, it is absolutely true and also confirmed via independent sources that UFC 60 drew in the low 600’s and UFC 61 drew in the high 700’s. That blows away every boxing PPV of 2006 except for the Oscar de la Hoya fight in May, which drew 925,000 buys.

  8. JOSH says:

    To be honest boxing has nothing to fear from in UFC (IMO) what they DO need to fear is themselves. Lack of competiton, viable heavyweight champions, sleazy promoters, non credible organizations with bogus title demands, etc…. are all hurting the sport of boxing and THAT is what will lead to and IS leading to the downfall in intrest inboxing in the US at least. As the HBO big wigs said, they scew a completly different demo than UFC.

  9. The Gaijin says:

    ^^ MMA should take note of this, as all these upstart orgs etc, have potential to create the same atmosphere here as well.

  10. Mr. Roadblock says:

    Ivan, you’re right that HBO execs did say that. However, my point is that the 350,000 buys are mostly Mexican, Filipino and super-hardcore boxing fans. The UFC is now drawing the people that used to be casual boxing fans and in many cases the younger viewers that would have become boxing fans if boxing wasn’t in the sorry state that it is now. If UFC did 750,000 buys that means on November 18, 2006 1.1 million fighting sport PPVs were bought in the U.S. Boxing got roughly 1/3rd of the buys.

  11. MMA Dave says:

    Wow! I had no idea that Fedor will be at the Bodog Fights. I am in Vancouver and I would have bought tickets just on the off chance that I could meet him. Now its to late. damn

  12. Ivan Trembow says:

    to Mr. Roadblock— You are absolutely correct about MMA creating new fans all the time and boxing not being anywhere near as capable of doing so.

    But regarding the 700,000 figure (not 750,000), first of all that’s not a reliable number for the aforementioned reasons, and second of all that alleged number was for UFC 63 (which took place on September 23rd), not UFC 65 (which took place on November 18th).

    But you’re right on with your overriding point that a heck of a lot of people were watching either MMA or boxing on the night of November 18th.

  13. Ivan Trembow says:

    “Wow! I had no idea that Fedor will be at the Bodog Fights. I am in Vancouver and I would have bought tickets just on the off chance that I could meet him. Now its to late. damn”

    Believe me, you can still get tickets. The building in Vancouver is probably not even going to be half-full, in part because they decided to promote a show in Canada around the “USA vs. Russia” theme. The USA vs. Russia theme drew horribly on US PPV just a couple of months ago with Maskaev vs. Rahman, and it’s not drawing any better in Canada.

  14. Zack says:

    Let’s not mention the Sherdog forums on here again. It brings this threads IQ down by at least 20 points.

  15. The Gaijin says:

    Ya. Why are you posting links to threads/posts that are clearly started by “trolls”???

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