Trending PPV Numbers For UFC 96

by Kelvin Hunt on Apr 6, 2009 11:18 AM EDT in News Comment 7 comments

The preliminary trending numbers are in for UFC 96, and it's close to where I thought it would be. According to Dave Meltzer, the numbers are around 350K for UFC 96. Which is just below the 375-400K prediction I had prior to the event. While those numbers are paltry compared to the numbers put up by UFC 91, 92, and 94, I think it's respectable considering what Zuffa had to work with. Some may point to this as Rampage Jackson not being the PPV draw that some thought he was. I think it's a couple of things that's not really related to the power of Rampage as a draw:

This event had a patchwork main event that was seen as a mis-match with little promotion and a pretty weak supporting card on paper
UFC 76 that featured Jardine in the main event against Chuck Liddell, and UFC posterboy Forrest Griffin vs. Shogun Rua(in his UFC debut) only mustered about a 100K more PPV buys than UFC 96
The UFC PPV numbers had to plateau at some point. There was no way for them to continue doing the numbers they were doing with the aforementioned PPV's of 91, 92, and 94.

So it appears that I missed the prediction by just a hair. I really thought and still think that event was sold on the UFC brand name more than anything. Like I said, there was little to no promotion for the event. I expect Zuffa to rebound well with UFC 97 on the horizon. Those crazy Canadians sure do love themselves some MMA.

HT: MMAPayout

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I spent some time talking to people I work with who are very casual MMA fans and at least two of them told me they weren’t ordering the card because they didn’t view Jardine as being any good. I tried to convince them that when he makes it out of the first minute of a fight he is very formidable but they weren’t having it.

I’d blame Jardine much more than anything else.

Contributing Editor - BloodyElbow.com - SBNation's mixed martial arts headquarters.

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by Brent Brookhouse on Apr 6, 2009 2:36 PM EDT reply actions 0 recs

Word, I honestly thought Rampage would take him in the second. I actually almost called to a tee, but somehow Jardine survived the onslaught and took it to a decision. But yea, I felt that most people thought it was a mis-match as well.

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by Kelvin Hunt on Apr 6, 2009 2:40 PM EDT reply actions 0 recs

I wouldn’t call it a miss-match as much as I’d say it’s the UFC stumbling. Too many fights too fast, and when they can’t book someone they want for a card they go to the next best thing.. which in this case was Keith Jardine. It was a good night of fights, but on paper it just looked like garbage.

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by -Neil- on Apr 6, 2009 3:10 PM EDT reply actions 0 recs

I was speaking from a casual fan perspective when I used the that term for the most part. I agree they were trying to go a little too fast with the matchmaking….

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by Kelvin Hunt on Apr 6, 2009 3:15 PM EDT reply actions 0 recs