« A WEC PPV without the WEC name | Home | Dana White: UFC won’t do a business deal with CBS because CBS is tarnished now »
Takeaways from the first Zuffa non-branded PPV event in company history
By Zach Arnold | April 24, 2010
1. The UFC/WEC merger has happened, but nobody bothered to announce it.
I wasn’t the only one who noticed that the WEC brand was destroyed tonight, but what amazed me was just how many casual MMA fans thought this was a UFC show. I’m dead serious.
Don’t get me wrong — we knew that Zuffa was going to run this show going in, but not to the extent that happened tonight. But give the company credit — they masterfully took away the WEC brand and threw it out the door. Because of it, I think the buy rate for this PPV is going to be significantly more respectable than I had predicted. I had predicted 25,000 buys, simply because the WEC brand was weak going in. Zuffa was simply a step ahead of my logic and they stripped the original WEC premise away from the event. If they do end up with 75,000 buys or more, it will be the most remarkable testament to branding power I have ever seen in my life in the fight business. PRIDE had a huge following of 20 million viewers on Fuji TV, but that was over-the-air broadcasting. This is pay television, a far different ball game.
Even in the NFL where players wear helmets and often aren’t recognizable to casual fans, there is still a loyalty to certain superstars. With Zuffa, they have managed to change the formula and turn it upside down. As big of superstars as Brock Lesnar and Georges St. Pierre are, it is Zuffa’s branding power that gives the company a remarkable floor on PPV buys. This event tonight in Sacramento was exhibit A in the company’s history of basically formalizing an MMA event to equal UFC. Forget Strikeforce and WEC, every MMA event in the eyes of most American fans is a UFC event.
BTW, when footage of Faber/Aldo aired on Comcast Sportsnet Bay Area, it was tagged as “UFC.”
2. Urijah Faber, Georges St. Pierre, and Brock Lesnar are the three fighters that draw their own unique & distinct live audiences.
The branding power of UFC gives Zuffa enormous leverage on the television and PPV side of the equation. On the live house side of the equation, there simply aren’t many fighters who can draw their own cult-like following. But Faber, St. Pierre, and Lesnar are the three that can do it in combination with Zuffa’s branding power. There is a clear difference between the crowds UFC has drawn in Sacramento and the Sacramento crowds that attend Urijah Faber fights. The Faber crowds are so loud and passionate and excited that it makes you want to give all them a big hug for being wonderful fans.
3. How much life does Urijah Faber’s career have left?
He’s got his training facilities in Sacramento. Tonight was his first huge pay-day of his career. He has a couple of fights left in him, I suspect, and then he can retire. Unlike a lot of fighters, Urijah seems to be on solid financial ground. He’s not a dummy. He’s a unique fighter who can win or lose and people will still think of him as #1 in their hearts, at least casual fans anyways.
4. Heavyweights are king, but the fans are ready to pay for the smaller guys in MMA.
It was like a light bulb switch had turned on tonight with the casual MMA fans that thought this event was a UFC show. If you paid attention to the reactions at local bars/restaurants showing this event, what you saw was a real desire by the pro-UFC audiences to see the smaller guys more on PPV and TV. Despite the one-sided nature of the main event and semi-main event, you have to consider tonight’s PPV a large success in opening up new doors for many fighters who are deserving of a big pay-day for the first time in their careers.
5. MMA judging is at an all-time low and it’s doing a disservice to the entire industry.
We’ve had so many judging debacles in the last couple of years (including the Doug Crosby BS that was the cherry on the top of the crap sandwich) that the last thing I need to endure as an MMA supporter is to watch more controversy involving judging. However, it seems the topic always rears its head at every event.
Nelson Hamilton and Abe Belardo working tonight’s show — give me a break. The scoring for Leonard Garcia over The Korean Zombie was not a correct score, IMO. Even worse is the fact that the judges are scared to death to give any round a 10-10 or a 9-9 score. Look, we know Zuffa isn’t exactly into judges who do that kind of scoring, but judges are supposed to be independent arbiters here after all… in theory, anyways.
6. Jose Aldo represents the next generation of Brazilian super stars that will dominate the industry for a decade.
Going back to the early 1990s when I really started following and writing about MMA (before that term was coined), you watched Royce Gracie in UFC and Rickson Gracie in Vale Tudo Japan. Then came PRIDE and got Shogun & Ninja & Wanderlei & The Nogueira Brothers and lots of great Brazilian talent. Now, we have the third wave of amazing Brazilian talent in MMA with Jose Aldo, Marlon Sandro, Anderson Silva, and Machida. Some of the Brazilian fighters are horribly frustrating to watch, but in general it’s a beautiful thing to see the Brazilians stock pile new talent to represent their country every few years and do so in such a dominate fashion.
Topics: Media, MMA, UFC, WEC, Zach Arnold | 25 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
While you won’t find a bigger WEC fan than me, I think people really have gotten too caught up in hype when it comes to the buyrate it will do around 50k to 70k and it will be a success.
Anything more than that would have Dana doing cartwheels, just like people are quick to pronounce UFC shows that make money but only draw over 200k busts which is a joke.
Hardcore’s are vastly overestimating the appeal of this fight to casuals, the only thing that this show needs to do is reach their baseline for profit which internal estimates peg around 50k or so.
Anything less will be considered a disapointment and anything more a party but some of the estimates i’m seeing from people clearly show that alot of people have no clue about how buyrates work.
I agree with lots of this but Machida I think is 30 or 31 and Anderson is mid-thirties, so I wouldn’t really put them in the same age bracket as a kid like Aldo. BTW am I the only one who think he kills Frankie Edgar?
why do people always say there is a problem with judging whenever they dont agree with a score? it is like with bisping hammill fight, everyone thinks the ufc must be corrupt because of the score but even sherdog scored it for bisping. Brent Brookhouse from Bloodyelbow and Dave Meltzer both scored the fight for Garcia and they know what they are watching, judging is subjective and just because a judge sees it differently to you does not mean that there is a huge problem with judging
9-9 score?
A 9-9 score is impossible unless there is a point deduction for a foul. There is a reason it is called the 10-point MUST system. Somebody MUST get a 10 every round (barring deductions).
It’s a shame Sandro has no interest in the WEC due to his teammate being the champ. Nova Uniao is cranking out some unbelievable talent in the lighter weight classes.
I think your point on Brazil is point on, I also want to point out that nearly every elite Brazilian fighter is under the management of Ed Soares. That dude gets face time on nearly every Zuffa PPV (I’m saying this now because of last night). Hell, he was being used as a translator during the broadcast for Aldo’s corner.
If anything, that guy is really brilliant.
According to Dana, the reason for the lack of WEC branding was that their contract with Versus prohibited them from airing a WEC event on Spike TV. Thus all WEC logos and branding were removed. A deal was done whereby Spike would be allowed to broadcast the prelims under the ‘Aldo vs Faber’ event branding.
The continued lack on WEC in the main PPV broadcast means that they will be able to re-air the event on Spike (counter-programming Strikeforce in May possibly?) as they do with other PPV’s, without breaching the Versus contract.
Take that for what it’s worth…
Belardo actually had the fight 29-28 Jung. It was Dan Stell that gave the fight to Garcia.
Garcia vs Jung was not a bad decision. People need to stop acting like the judges are horrible everytime a close decision happens. A few reporters had the fight for Garcia.
I was at the last Bellator show and after watching Cooper vs. Carl, I had no doubt in my mind that Cooper won the last two rounds. Yet when I got home, nobody on TV saw it that way. At best, they gave the 2nd round a draw. Things look differently on TV then they do 10 rows from cage side. And look different then being right at the cage.
Plus, I have seen Garcia fight live. The guy punches very hard. I’m sure the punching power made much of the difference in the eyes if the judges.
This isn’t the first time Jung has seen the bad side of a decision lately. Makes me think that watching him live gives a different perspective.
Lastly, too many arm chair judges take note of each round but don’t actually make a sound decision after each round and stick to it. They watch the whole fight and work backwards. The judges don’t have that luxary. And that makes a huge difference on close fights.
It wasn’t the best decision, but hardly a robbery of any sort. Nor was it an example of bad judging.
45, in your frothing-at-the-mouth zeal to defend anything Zuffa, you really look more biased than usual this time around. Your primary argument seems to be that Garcia punches hard (whether or not he LANDS any of these winging shots being irrelevant), and that two notable reporters (one of whom being Meltzer, who looks primarily at the business and showmanship of MMA rather than technical merit – see his proclaimation of Frye vs. Takayama as being one of the greatest MMA fights ever) out of the vast majority of MMA judges think that Garcia won it (without really offering any good reasons as to why), so that makes it okay.
Let’s ignore the fact that despite the OVERWHELEMING POWER of Garcia (which Jung repeatedly took and kept coming, landing more accurate strikes and greater quantity, faltering only once), Jung dictated the pace and control of the fight ENTIRELY, had the only notable advantage on the ground, and for about 75% of the fight had Garcia on the backfoot or pressed up against the cage. But Garcia sure punches hard!
Fightmetric also has Jung outstriking Garcia by a wide margin: http://fightmetric.com/fights/Garcia-Jung.html
Once again, despite getting lambasted for his erratic and self-aggrandizing display on message boards, putting his objectivity into question, they use NOTED BAD JUDGE (see the entire last week of posts on this website) Nelson Hamilton in this fight. And his score ends up being part of the controversy. But there’s no issue with bad judging in MMA! No way!
Those fightmetric numbers don’t really support the ‘robbery’ claims.
They show the first round as a clear round for Jung, the second round as a draw, and the third round as a close round for Jung. It’s not unreasonable to think someone else might have scored the second & third for Garcia, especially given the unspoken rule that seems to exist against scoring 10-10 rounds.
It benefits Zuffa more if Jung wins. So if I was a UFC nuthugger, I would be protesting the decision.
Fight stats mean nothing to me. They are not cageside. I know from watching on TV, that sometimes more then 20% of the strikes are hard to tell if they landed. And they have the same views I do. I’ve said it before and I have said it again…. Anybody using those stats in a real debate shows their ignorance and really kills their own credibilty.
OK, let’s seriously cut the bullcrap 45.
There is no possible way Jung lost. R1 he was backing up Garcia the whole round, and then KNOCKED HIM DOWN with strikes. This is 10-9 for Jung. This is not even debatable.
R2 Jung was landing more and better strikes, and then took Garcia down, controlled him and went for a finish on the ground. This was the most significant event of the round, easily. Again, this is not debatable – it was 10-9 Jung.
R3 is irrelevant because R1 and R2 had to be 10-9 for Jung, but I would give him a l0-9 here as well for being the aggressor and landing better strikes.
The only explanation for the judging is a) the decisions are being called by Zuffa b) The judges are making decisions based on what they think will make the fans and/or UFC management happy, or c) they’re all completely mentally retarded.
I can’t believe it’s C. I just can’t. One thing in common with these screwjob decisions is that the fans in the arena ALWAYS boo the screwjobs. 15-20,000 people CLEARLY know who wins a fight, but the three people being paid to judge it have no idea? How is this possible?
Garcia was the fan favorite vs. Jung, yet they booed his win. This happened because people buy MMA tickets to see a sport, not a fix or screwjob. If they wanted that they’d be at Monday Night RAW and now WEC.
I think you are confusing Hamilton with Douglas Crosby.
I thought it was a very good show. Of course it didn’t quite live up to the hype (which some online fans were acting like the show was going to feature the ultimate battle of Armageddon.) But if you dislike the show you’re just out to hate for hate’s sake.
Jung won IMO, but like always if you don’t finish the fight don’t cry about it. Hell of a fight, though. One review I saw of it likened it to like a Wanderlei Silva vs. Wanderlei Silva Mortal Kombat mirror match.
As I said in my thoughts on the hype show, they made Faber look like 2007 Matt Hughes, and that’s certainly what he is after the fight. He’ll probably fight Brown for the rights to fight Gamburyn or Aldo in a rematch but I don’t know what to do with the guy. He certainly couldn’t hang at UFC’s 155.
Much respect to Ben Henderson. That was one hell of a performance. I was hoping for a 5 round war again, but that was just awesome work and is why he’s one of my favorite fighters.
And I think the days of weight classes dictating fan interest/buys died last decade. You’ve got boxing dominated by the 140 guys and MMA being a smaller man’s sport with actually a stigma that the heavyweight fights usually suck. Of course that view is being phased out now that Tim Sylvia and Big Foot are being replaced by Brock Lesnar and Cain Velasquez, but still the “everything beyond 205 is going to suck” view lives. But I see no reason why, if UFC had a 145 pound main or co-headline the fans wouldn’t pay to see it if you were guaranteed typical WEC action. Aldo would at least be as big of a star as Anderson Silva if he had the Zuffa machine behind him.
I think 145 can headline a UFC. Still not sure about 135 or 125. Those guys look tiny. They kind of have to break people in by weight class and get them visually use to each lower weight. But that won’t be a big deal…. Just takes time.
Yeah, people need to remember that all of the naysaying arguments were once used against the Welterweight and Lightweight divisions. But when people saw how exciting they were they quickly got over it. But of course MMA fans have the memories of Alzheimer’s sufferers so the cycle repeats.
Cruz is about 5’10” if my memory is correct, so that may help ease em in.
45 Huddle,
I think that those guys are tiny, BUT, if you get them in the cage and zoom in on them without other points of reference (like Frank Mir standing next to them), then I think that their small stature is lost. So I guess what I am saying is that if you have two small guys fighting one another, then you have a really good chance of them looking “normal” on the telecast.
BTW, White is claiming the lack of brand was a licensing issue with Versus.
This show will do a number and Zuffa will decide how to proceed from there. That is my crazy prediction. Until then, all the talk is meaningless. I don’t think they have any idea what the real plans are right now for the WEC, nor do I really care.
Honestly, why is everyone up in arms about how a decision went between two guys who playacted a Toughman contest? In a week we will all have forgotten that fight happened. By this afternoon your average MMA fan had already forgot who the hell that was fighting, assuming they even bothered to watch in the first place. Shouldn’t there be something more pressing? Talk of Aldo’s next defense, perhaps?
Finally got a chance to watch the card on PVR. Effin’ eh that was an excellent card…well worth my $45. Not sure how many of those cards they can put on with their current roster, but in terms of pure entertainment it was the best card I’ve seen in a while. Whoever took the chance and bought this card definitely got their money’s worth and UFWEC probably made some fans coming out of this one.
Wasn’t surprised Benderson beat Cerrone, but was surprised how quickly it happened. MTB looked horrendous – sluggish and flat and just telegraphed everything, but props to Manvel – he looked much better/more comfortable on his feet than any previous fights. 145 is a far better weight for him, but he’s still pretty short.
Aldo is a killer. Dude is a machine and totally dismantled Faber…Faber’s got a ton of heart and is still an elite FW, but man is Aldo just on another level (interesting to see the longevity on Aldo’s reign). But the UFC had another star cemented here.
“Jung won IMO, but like always if you don’t finish the fight don’t cry about it.”
This is such a retarded statement. Why can’t there just be competent judges and an actual scoring system in place that makes sense. You can’t expect a finish every time, but this fight was super easy to judge. Jung won every round IMO.
People (Joe Rogan proved it by how horrible he was on commentary) seemed to be enamoured with Garcia “winging haymakers like he’s throwing a 90mph fastball!!!!!!!!”
I honestly think that being ringside and not seeing properly on tv could have really affected the judges perception. Every exchange was pretty friggin wild and hairy and it probably looked like Garcia was landing more than he did (he landed little)…not to mention, I don’t think it helped that any time Garcia did land the Zombie seemed to really rock to and fro – making it look like he was hurting him a lot more than he actually did. Jung walked through a lot of his shots in the sense that they didn’t really hurt him at all, but he was just really awkward and made it look like he was getting rocked every time he got hit.
Sounds like a great card. Unfortunately none of my friends even called to try and get a group together to split it, and with this latest PPV stretch I wasn’t going to shoulder it alone.
The Saturday night boxing was great, and glad to hear the Faber vs Aldo card was as well. As a consumer I felt Q1 more or less sucked on both ends, and I really needed something to get me excited about both sports again. I’ll catch these fights online and hopefully the spark will be back.