Is MMA big or is UFC big?
The staggering sums lost by promotions trying to compete at the national level in MMA give rise to the question,…
The staggering sums lost by promotions trying to compete at the national level in MMA give rise to the question, is MMA big, or is the UFC big? If MMA is big, then there may be space for the right effort to make money. If the UFC is big, then there isn’t, and those trying will end up on a tombstone in Dana’s office.
The UFC’s move from Spike to FOX will provide a window on whether Mixed Martial Arts has major legs on its own, as detailed in an MMJunkie interview with John Ourand, a veteran reporter for “SportsBusiness Daily.”
Although Spike TV holds broadcast rights to UFC programming such as “Unleashed” and “The Ultimate Fighter” through 2012, speculation on its future association with MMA has run rampant.
Rival promotion Bellator repeatedly has denied a possible move to the channel despite the fact that its broadcast partner, MTV2, shares a corporate partner with Spike TV in Viacom.
Will Spike TV then jump into bed with another burgeoning MMA promotion in hopes of supplanting the ratings drawn by the UFC, or will another channel get into the MMA business?
While sources say Spike is looking sell its broadcast rights back to the UFC and get out of the sport, Ourand believes the dust is still settling and networks don’t yet have a sense of how things will shake out.
“I think right now, Versus and Spike and every sports media network out there is taking a look at the popularity of UFC, and there’s a big question of whether it’s really UFC popularity or (if) it’s MMA popularity,” Ourand said. “I think you’ll see a lot of people taking a lot of bets on different MMA shows.
“As for Spike, they have the luxury of a little bit of time. They have the UFC library for another 12 months, and you can believe that they’re planning, I can imagine, to really utilize that. I can see them doing counter-programming against shows that are going to be on FX.”
The next year, then, could be the most significant measure of the sport’s long-term appeal.