EXC sets new tv rating record for MMA

Vince135792003

EliteXC on CBS peaks with 6.51 million viewers
by MMAjunkie.com Staff on Jun 03, 2008 at 3:23 pm ET


This past Saturday's "EliteXC: PRIMETIME" event, which aired on CBS as part of the new "Saturday Night Fights" series, peaked with 6.51 million viewers during a main event between Kevin "Kimbo Slice" Ferguson and James Thompson, according to updated Nielsen live plus same day ratings for May 31.

The ratings for the final 51 minutes of the event weren't initially available because the event ran past its two-hour scheduled time.

The addition of that data lifted ratings for the entire broadcast and eclipsed previous U.S. MMA ratings records held by the UFC and Spike TV.

The UFC's two highest rated events on Spike TV are UFC 75 (5.93 million viewers) and UFC Final Chapter: Ortiz vs. Shamrock III (5.89 million), according to a an email sent today by Spike TV. Spike TV is in 96.1 million homes. CBS is in 112.8 million.

As MMAjunkie.com (www.mmajunkie.com) reported on Sunday, the 9 to 11 p.m. Eastern portion of the show did a 2.7 rating and a 5 share, an audience of 4.3 million viewers, according to preliminary Nielsen ratings for Saturday.

While leading up to the event, EliteXC Live Events President Gary Shaw had estimated the show would garner anywhere from four million to 10 million viewers.

The event delivered an overall 3.0/06 (rating/share) with 4.85 million viewers; 2.2/07 in both adults 25-54 and adults 18-49; 2.3/09 in adults 18-34; 3.1/09 in men 25-54; 3.0/10 in men 18-49; and 3.2/12 in men 18-34.

"Saturday Night Fights" cleared approximately 95 percent of CBS stations in the country. The telecast was pre-empted in those remaining markets due to coverage of the Children’s Miracle Network Telethon.

Much like Spike TV's brodcast of The Ultimate Fighter 1 Finale that put the UFC on the map in 2005, Saturday's EliteXC broadcast saw half-hour gains in viewers throughout the broadcast. A total of 3.38 million viewers were watching at 9 p.m., and the broadcast peaked at 6.51 million at 11:30 p.m.

EliteXC also today announced that a replay of "EliteXC: PRIMETIME" will air on Showtime on Friday, June 13 at 11 p.m.

So somebody that being Gary Shaw I guess, in the MMA/pro-wrestling world is happy with their tv rating, for 1 day anyway.

If anybody saw the show, what did they think of it?

In an ideal world I guess I would have preferred Pulver and Faber to be the main event but given the fighters EXC have, which to be fair aren't the greatest, I thought they did a decent job at putting on an entertaining show.

I'm in 2 minds when it comes to Kimbo Slice in terms of him as the main event guy but he drew a rating.

Fozzy

I watched most of it and it was ok for what it was. I enjoyed Kimbo's fight, I was impressed with him in the first round when he was able to do some sweeps on the ground and he didn't seem lost there. But he did look a bit lost on the ground in the second round

The best fight would've been Lawler vs Smith, but the ending hurt it. You should never say that you can't see if you think your vision will come back and you want to fight. Still, if they're doing a second tv show (which I hear has been postponed from the intended date of a few months time because they haven't got enough stars to fight) then a rematch should draw

There's a few questions that the whole thing raises in my mind. First, what would the UFC have done with that slot? They got about one million less viewers for less marketable fighters on a cable channel with UFC 75 from London. Is Kimbo still as big a draw now that he didn't look so great? What if they'd had someone like Frank Shamrock on the card, someone who usually has great fights, or if the Lawler/Smith fight had gone on to be a great fight? They could've created a star if it had gone right

I watched the press conference afterwards and the Frank Shamrock interview segment and Brett Rogers (I think...a heavyweight who won a fight on the show, big black guy) said that he saw Kimbo tap and he thinks that Kimbo is garbage. It came across like a total wrestling angle and I think they should just go with that fight for the second show

I'm guessing that many people who saw the show were not MMA fans and I'm glad that there was nothing completely terrible on the show or anything that would make MMA look bad

EDIT: Haha, didn't realise I'd written so much on that

Vince135792003

It was an entertaining show. I just thought for their sake and for my entertainment I would have loved if they could have had one truly top notch level fight like a Torres/Mueida just so new people tuning in could see it for what a great sport it is.

The way they promote Kimbo (the constant hammering home of how he fought in street fights only a couple of years ago) has me in 2 minds. The pro-wrestling fan inside me loves it but I also think that it's portraying an image of the sport and not necessarily a good one that the UFC has been trying to quash for a long time.

nacho libre

I thought the fight of the night was between the two women- and i don't mean that in a derogatory way. Lawler and Smith would have got my vote for fight of the night except for that unfortunate ending. Still, it means the organisation will get good ratings for the rematch.

Regarding the Kimbo fight it was correct to stop it when the ref did as it was only a matter of time before Thompson was sent crashing to the canvas. however, i do feel Kimbo was lucky not to lose in the second round. If that was in the UFC i suspect the ref' may have called a halt to the fight. I think an average ufc fighter would beat Kimbo - unless he can keep the fight from going to the ground. He is a limited fighter and i don't think he has the ability to improve to beat a good fighter
So if EliteXC are smart they'll wait before throwing a fighter with pedigree - Frank Shamrock, for example - at Kimbo. This is of course presuming he doesn't lose to the guy, who probably should have been fighting Kimbo, on Saturday, as he had knocked out Thompson in his previous fight before Saturday's fight.

Vince135792003

nacho libre wrote: »

So if EliteXC are smart they'll wait before throwing a fighter with pedigree - .

If Elite are smart, I think they should find a "new Kimbo" to market, Ortiz maybe and have Slice fight second from the top of the card fighting guys like Ken Shamrock, Frye etc..

Fozzy

nacho libre wrote: »

If that was in the UFC i suspect the ref' may have called a halt to the fight.

I doubt it, the ref for that fight has been on a good few UFC shows this year. He goes by the commission's rules, not the promotion's rules

I thought the ref was going to stop it at the end of the second round, but I think I read somewhere that Kimbo was telling the ref that he's ok. I think the ref also told Thompson to defend himself before Kimbo got those last few shots in

flahavaj

This Kimbo guy seems like the Necro Butcher of MMA: not suited for the big leagues, unorthodox style of fighting, with a legion of cult followers in his respective little worlsd of MMa/pro wrestling.

Fozzy

flahavaj wrote: »

This Kimbo guy seems like the Necro Butcher of MMA: not suited for the big leagues, unorthodox style of fighting, with a legion of cult followers in his respective little worlsd of MMa/pro wrestling.

Not quite. If I was going to compare him to a wrestler it'd be Cena. Not liked by the hardcore fans but someone who can attract a huge audience, although not that great technically (Cena's improved though obviously). Necro doesn't appeal to the casual wrestling fans, but Kimbo clearly appeals to the casual and even non-MMA fans after that rating

Minto

Fozzy wrote: »

Not quite. If I was going to compare him to a wrestler it'd be Cena. Not liked by the hardcore fans but someone who can attract a huge audience, although not that great technically (Cena's improved though obviously). Necro doesn't appeal to the casual wrestling fans, but Kimbo clearly appeals to the casual and even non-MMA fans after that rating

Thats a great way of putting it Foz. From what I've seen of Kimbo (which I'll concede is not a whole lot) he isn't great (technically), but he can win fights and generally entertains the viewers.

EDIT: I just realised that I basically rehashed Fozzy's post, lol!

[Cheap plug]BTW, I dunno how many of ye were online this weekend, but me and VR put out a recap show of the year so far. We only went as far as WrestleMania in terms of PPVs but covered a lot. Check it out! [/Cheap plug]

the flananator

flahavaj wrote: »

This Kimbo guy seems like the Necro Butcher of MMA: not suited for the big leagues, unorthodox style of fighting, with a legion of cult followers in his respective little worlsd of MMa/pro wrestling.

Necro Buther would never, ever draw a 6.51 million viewer rating!

Vince135792003

Minto wrote: »

From what I've seen of Kimbo (which I'll concede is not a whole lot) he isn't great (technically), but he can win fights and generally entertains the viewers.

He can win fights against Tank Abbott and just about James Thompson. I think he's very limited in who you can put him in the cage with.

nacho libre

Vince135792003 wrote: »

If Elite are smart, I think they should find a "new Kimbo" to market, Ortiz maybe and have Slice fight second from the top of the card fighting guys like Ken Shamrock, Frye etc..

Well, that's a good point but in the meantime they have a lot of money riding on Kimbo so they will have to be careful who they put him against as it's only a matter of time before he loses. I think even a faded Shamrock would beat him.

If Elite XC could set up a fight between Frank Shamrock V Ortiz they would do very good ratings. It would be great to see this match happen.

the flananator

What does the "XC" stand for? Xtreme combat?

Fozzy

the flananator wrote: »

What does the "XC" stand for? Xtreme combat?

Yeah

the flananator

Fozzy wrote: »

Yeah

Hehe ok. This Elite XC intrigues me. I've tried to get into UFC in the past but it bores me; everyone just seems so generic. With this Kimbo guy, its like he has a gimmick, a character, something to set him apart from the others, and I like that.

Fozzy

the flananator wrote: »

Hehe ok. This Elite XC intrigues me. I've tried to get into UFC in the past but it bores me; everyone just seems so generic. With this Kimbo guy, its like he has a gimmick, a character, something to set him apart from the others, and I like that.

To be honest, the only guys like that in EXC are Kimbo and Frank Shamrock. There's pretty much no one else with any real charisma. Phil Baroni maybe, but he's not a great fighter. And neither is Kimbo. Many people say the same about Frank but he's certainly got more talent than the other two guys I mentioned

In the UFC there are plenty of guys with personalities that set them apart I believe. Guys like Rampage, Liddell, Lesnar, Ortiz. Then there's the feuds that have really given guys characters like Penn vs Sherk or Serra vs Hughes. And then there's the guys who mightn't have the most appealing personalities, but they're some of the best fighters in the world, like St Pierre, Anderson Silva and Nogueira. Those three are at a completely different level than anyone in EXC. And so are many other UFC fighters

I think in the end what's going to happen is that EXC will create new MMA fans. These fans will check out the UFC at one point or another and be more impressed with it, as I believe that there are more good fights in the UFC, the personalities are built up better and the production quality is a lot better

There's nothing wrong with liking EXC though, I've really enjoyed some stuff they've done. I just don't see them competing with the UFC if they stay as they are and put on shows just like the one at the weekend

Vince135792003

I think 1 area that they do have an edge is with Gina Carano, the marquee MMA female star that they have.

Now Saturday wasn't her best night in many ways but if she gets her act together, she could be a super star. I mean she did win and maybe to a new fan she was impressive but it would have been nice to see her come in 100% and showcase how good she really is.

Vince135792003

For flanantor: Quinton Jackson, a UFC fighter dripping with charisma. This clip is great: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m31bNNNTTlw&eurl=

Minto

I know it wasn't for me, but thanks for the link Vince. I didn't know Rampage was in the running for BA Baracus! I'm looking really starting to look forward to the fight now.