Paige n Sage prove to be a ratings hit

The UFC made a bet at UFC on FOX 22 that sex sells. The December FOX event is marketed to the NFL audience making it one of the most-viewed events of the year. The man events tend to be correspondingly big – just shy of a PPV level fight.

2013 main event: Champion Demetrious Johnson vs. Joseph Benavidez.
2014 main event: Former heavyweight champion Junior Dos Santos vs. future champion Stipe Miocic.
2015 Main event: Lightweight champion Rafael dos Anjos vs. Donald Cerrone.

The 2016 main event was Paige VanZant vs. Michelle Waterson. And the co-main was Sage Northcutt vs. Mikey Gall. To put Northcutt into context, Bryan Barbarena was in the middle of the prelims. And Barbarena beat Northcutt this year and then beat Warlley Alves who had been an undefeated 10-0. And Barbarena lost on Saturday.

Neither VanZant nor Northcutt has a skillset suitable to main event a major card. Northcutt lost and looked like he didn’t belong in the UFC. VanZant lost a fan-pleasing fight, and looked like a blue belt on the ground.

However, the UFC is under tremendous pressure to realize a return on a $4,000,000,000 investment, and thus have to make decisions not on what the hardcore fanbase knows is legitimate, but rather on what will put asses in seats.

It worked.

For the last three years, the December Big FOX event has averaged 2,800,000 viewers. Saturday’s event got 3,178,000 viewers. It was the highest rated Big FOX show since UFC on Fox 7: Henderson vs. Melendez on April 20, 2013, which got 3,742,000. Saturday’s event peaked with 4,800,000 viewers from 10-10:15 p.m. ET during the Waterson vs. VanZant main event.

And the event’s success was not due to a general increase in interest. The FOX Sports 1 prelims averaged 679,000 viewers, down from the 693,000 that last December’s Big FOX show got.

As weird as it can be to have a blue belt main eventing a big card, and a Sage Northcutt co-main eventing, mixed martial arts has a built-in failsafe. If your skill level is insufficient, you get beat up.

PVZ vowed she will be back, and will. Northcutt said he is dropping to lightweight. As least he will finally get rid of that gut.

H/T MMAWeekly