Quote of the Day: Dana White Projects 6 Million Viewers for Kimbo Slice vs Roy Nelson on The Ultimate Fighter
by Nate Wilcox on Sep 29, 2009 1:18 PM EDT
in MMA News
Email
Print
One of the reasons why you are in town is to promote Wednesday's TUF fight between Kimbo Slice and Roy Nelson. Are you surprised by how much buzz this fight -- as well as the whole season -- has generated thus far?
We knew it was going to be big, we just didn't know how big it was going to be. We did 5.1 million viewers the first week, 4.1 last week, and this Wednesday we think that we're going to do more than both of those.
I heard you predicted 7 million viewers for this Wednesday's show.
No, I'm predicting 6 million.
So, 7 million might be a little aggressive?
Dude, if we do 7 million ... I'm not going to say anything. I already put my foot in my mouth at UFC 100.
Dana White talking to Ariel Helwani.
Dave Meltzer has some context for the numbers and Kimbo's status as a star attraction:
Largely due to Slice’s presence, the first two episodes of the season were the two highest rated episodes in the history of the show. While it’s not a lock episode three will be a record-setter just because the first week’s 4.1 million viewers for the first-run episode blew away even the most optimistic of predictions, it should at worst be in the same ballpark. The hype pushing Slice vs. Nelson as the most anticipated fight in the history of the show is not overblown.
In Slice’s four pro fights, three broke records. He set the all-time Showtime MMA ratings record (since broken by the Gina Carano vs. Cris Santos fight) for a fight with Tank Abbott. His two matches on CBS, against James Thompson and Seth Petruzelli, are two of the three most-watched television matches in U.S. MMA history.
45 comments
|
0 recs |
Do you like this story?
Comments
I may be a conspiracy theorist here but
Dude, if we do 7 million … I’m not going to say anything. I already put my foot in my mouth at UFC 100.
That means 100 didn’t do the rumored 1.6 million and that number is inflated.
except with Mayweather where he was very far off
Editor - BloodyElbow.com - SBNation's mixed martial arts headquarters.
by Brent Brookhouse on Sep 29, 2009 2:20 PM EDT up reply actions
How do you know this? If they aren’t verified by anyone what makes you think they are spot on?
by Ty Lannister on Sep 29, 2009 3:59 PM EDT up reply actions
The Randy Couture trial and UFC 68 numbers...
Were Spot on.
"Respond intelligently even to unintelligent treatment."
-Lao Tzu
That’s a really stranger conclusion to which you’ve jumped.
...Behold, a pale horse. The man that sat upon it was Wieters, and hell followed with him.
"BJ on the BE" - Kierkegaard
WIth TUF 10 drawing so many viewers, and I assume some of them are new viewers to the sport, you’d think Dana would make sure the fighters came in shape. 4.1 million viewers watching the fighters gas in the first 3 minutes and keel over fighting over oxygen for the final 2 rounds?
Are you really blaming Dana for the fighters gassing?
you’d think Dana would make sure the fighters came in shape
What more do you want the guy to do? He told them show up ready to fight, he gave them a huge incentive to do so, he gave them a gym, a team and coaches.
At some point, you’ve gotta put some responsibility on the fighters, Dana can’t sit there next to the treadmill and hold their hand
Plus when you look at a guy like Shivers you’d think he’d have a good gas tank. Of course you might make the same mistake with Phil Baroni.
Walla walla walla I'm an idiot.
by ufc4 on Sep 29, 2009 1:57 PM EDT via mobile up reply actions
especially because the fighters should have been expecting to fight as soon as they got there, like has happened on the past few seasons.
You can’t really blame Dana for them gassing.
no
but we all know that in past TUFs they didn’t really show the fights in the order they actually happened. They could have just edited so it would show some of the better fights first before the Kimbo fight because of all the new fans they would bring in with the season. I just think they could have shown better fights and give a better impression of the sport. I’m sure many noobs were turned off by the first two fights and might not want to spend 40 bucks on PPV.
I don’t know any examples of them changing the order of fights. They change the order of stuff that happens outside of the cage, and they may flip flop semifinal fights, but how could they change the order of the first round fights when their results impact who gets to pick the next fights?
this is from an interview with Amir
I’ve talked to some TUF contestants who said that a lot of the footage has been taken out of order. Stuff that happened in week six was shown in week one, that kind of thing. Is that true?
A lot of the stuff is out of order, and some things they purposely left out to make certain points. But I think everything they did was for a reason. At least I hope so. I don’t know, I’m not a TV editor or anything.
They’re really good at getting you to believe what they want you to believe as you’re watching it. It makes me think twice now whenever I watch another reality show. I know now that it isn’t necessarily really how things were, but how they made what happened into what they wanted it to be.
I know this is not talking about the fights itself, but I know I’ve read about the bouts in particular in the past, I just wish I could have found it but I can’t at the moment. But this is reality TV, they edit it in a way they can make you think it goes down in a certain way that it does not. They can tape things twice or later on such as the fight picks so it will work well on the final edited version. I remember seeing an episode where one of the guys had a black eye and he hadn’t fought yet, things like that.
But they can’t switch the order of the first round fights. In the later rounds, yes, they can have all the fights in that round in one or 2 days (which makes sense in regards to injured fighters and everyone having close to the same amount of time to recover) and air them in an order that is entertaining, but when the winner of the fight gets control over the next fights, they can’t really show them out of order
Showing a prank from the house out of order doesn’t really effect the actual fights. The editing may embellish the effect that injuries or pranks have on those fights, but they don’t change the results of the tournament, and showing first round fights out of order would do that.
no they wouldn’t, they can still change the order of the first 8 bouts, more fights, more possibilities… I’m not talking about pranks here.
how can they change the order when the winning coach gets to pick the next fight?
The only example anyone has shown of anyone saying that fights are shown out of order is in the semifinals in past seasons, when it doesn’t really matter because all the fights are the same day.
If you have a better example, give it.
my guess is they can tape many times them calling out the fighters to fight in different scenarios. I don’t understand why I need to give an example since I’m quoting ppl who have said this before. That’s all I’m doing here, it was said it was done before therefore there is no reason to think it can’t be done again. I’m not one of the show’s producer…
They reference the coaches’ coaching w/l record way too much on the show to show the fights out of order.
Plus in the early seasons they definitely couldn’t do this as they actually kicked the fighters out of the house.
Don't argue for the sake of arguing....
by Screwface on Sep 29, 2009 4:01 PM EDT via mobile up reply actions
I’m just saying something I heard before from fighters that have participated in the TUF show. If I’m wrong, than so are they :)
I think the events play out in a different order
(like stuff that occurs in the house), and sometimes fights happen back to back when they appear separated by days (like the first 2 fights this season), but I don’t think they actually change the order of the fights.
I worded it wrong…I am not blaming Dana.
I am just saying that it’s not great for the sport when 4 million + viewer tune in to see a couple guys gas out and keel over.
It’s embarrassing.
I’m going with 6.2 which I think is still a bit high.
What if Kimbo loses though? Do you think that will hurt ratings for the rest of the season? Not saying they should have tampered temporally with the show, but making this fight later in the season I don’t think would have been a bad idea.
"I call this here Clark Kent. Just sniff this, right here. It’s good, huh?! You smoke this s**t and you just wanna rip your clothes off in a phone booth and fight crime"
If Kimbo loses, the scenes from next week will include someone getting injured and speculation on Kimbo replacing them.
Right...
if he loses they’re going to find a way to make it VERY clear that he is still on the show.
Editor - BloodyElbow.com - SBNation's mixed martial arts headquarters.
by Brent Brookhouse on Sep 29, 2009 2:22 PM EDT up reply actions
week4 – postfight tension between nelson/slice builds
week5 – tension comes to a head and someone does something stupid (in the final seconds)
week6 – long drawn nonsense about whether dana will or won’t kick said person off the show
not too tough to imagine scenarios where they could drag it out like this for a few weeks.
can you tell i watch alot of crappy television?
6 Million Viewers Predicted for Kimbo v. Roy Nelson
Wow. That is a high number to me. I know it will be big, and I’m confident that it will be the highest rater fight in the history of the show, but 6 million? How many viewers did Koscheck v. Leben do?
...Behold, a pale horse. The man that sat upon it was Wieters, and hell followed with him.
"BJ on the BE" - Kierkegaard
I don’t think an extra 900k from teh first week is too much to ask for. Especially now that the word has gone out that Kimbo is definitely fighting, and they’ve been able to hype that separately from just the show.
Did they really do 5.1 million for the first week? I thought it was 4 million + for week one.
...Behold, a pale horse. The man that sat upon it was Wieters, and hell followed with him.
"BJ on the BE" - Kierkegaard
I’m sure it is, but that was the highest rated (and I guess most watched, although that wouldn’t necessarily be true) match in TUF history. 6 million is enormous.
...Behold, a pale horse. The man that sat upon it was Wieters, and hell followed with him.
"BJ on the BE" - Kierkegaard
Comments For This Post Are Closed
Secondary Sidebar
User Tools
Related FanPosts on Bloody Elbow
Related FanShots on Bloody Elbow
FanPosts
Community blog posts and discussion.
Recommended FanPosts
Recent FanPosts
MMA Rankings
