UFC

[bigg jay]

CASC is about a week late on this...

 

[Brandon]

I made the mistake of watching boxing again....  keep going back despite massive corruption.   115 - 111 for Wilder is insane....

[bigg jay]

6 minutes ago, Brandon said:

I made the mistake of watching boxing again....  keep going back despite massive corruption.   115 - 111 for Wilder is insane....

The only judge who got it right is from Winnipeg!

[Brandon]

I could be ok with the 113-113 card...  but nothing more then that.   I did enjoy the broadcast at how quiet it got after they announced the scores and everyone on the panel was speechless with the 115-111 and draw result.

On a good note at least the UFC card was decent and Shogun wasn't killed in the cage yet. 

[bigg jay]

What a sh!tshow... UFC 232 is being moved from Vegas to L.A. on 6 days notice because Jones still has roids in his system (same type as the ones from July 2017).  NSAC wont license him but Cali will.  I'm sure the fans travelling to Vegas for this are super happy with this decision.

[Brandon]

25 minutes ago, bigg jay said:

What a sh!tshow... UFC 232 is being moved from Vegas to L.A. on 6 days notice because Jones still has roids in his system (same type as the ones from July 2017).  NSAC wont license him but Cali will.  I'm sure the fans travelling to Vegas for this are super happy with this decision.

I read that some of the fighters didn't find out about the move until after the media reported it...  Apparently the move will cost them 5 million expected from the loss of revenue at the gate...

[bigg jay]

Gustavsson definitely didn't find out until after it was announced.

The fighters will also lose money (not including the costs involved with getting their teams/family relocated).  Nevada doesn't charge income tax while Cali does, so fighters will lose between 6-12% of their earnings.

[bigg jay]

 

[Brandon]

Floyd made that look easy.

 

So what's the count down before Jon Jones tests positive again and gets stripped of the LHW title for the 4th time?

[wbbfan]

First UFC on ESPN seemed great. Very entertaining card with lots of good quality fighters. On the downside, Stephen A Smith. I don't like him, though he wasn't the worst. 

I wouldn't bet on this level of quality from ESPN ufc events going forward though. I do hope they are better assembled then the fox stuff. It got to the point the ufc on fox was more miss than hit with events and fights. 

I love the cowboy fight. If it leads to a mcg fight that'd be fantastic. A great matchup that should be very entertaining and re-qualify one guy for a title shot late this year. 

[Brandon]

I barely noticed any differences from the move from Fox to ESPN  the production felt the same with the interviews being a bit more professional but the camera work seemed a bit off at times.      Great main event despite Dana White crying that it was an early stoppage (it wasn't). 

I would maybe say the quality of fights was a step down....  Greg Hardy as a co main event was absolutely embarrassing.   I'm glad it ended the way it did just to put more egg on the UFC face. 

Hopefully TSN carries all the future cards so that way I won't need to stream them...

[wbbfan]

On 2019-01-20 at 10:09 PM, Brandon said:

I barely noticed any differences from the move from Fox to ESPN  the production felt the same with the interviews being a bit more professional but the camera work seemed a bit off at times.      Great main event despite Dana White crying that it was an early stoppage (it wasn't). 

I would maybe say the quality of fights was a step down....  Greg Hardy as a co main event was absolutely embarrassing.   I'm glad it ended the way it did just to put more egg on the UFC face. 

Hopefully TSN carries all the future cards so that way I won't need to stream them...

I would say the top tier of quality was better, (when have we seen a showdown of 2 champs on free tv?) and the depth of the card was far better than normal. Hardy should have traded places with cowboy. That was a stupid spot to put the hardy fight. 

I didn't see that as an early stoppage either. I was pulling for TJ, but he got knocked down didn't defend several ground shots well, got up and got knocked back down. I'd rather see a stoppage like that 100 times out of 100 then see guys taking an extra shot when they are out cold. This isn't boxing, you don't need to maintain a 99% win ratio. climb back up the ladder and do better the next time. 

[The Unknown Poster]

In a surprise move, UFC has ended traditional PPV in the US.

If you're in the US and want to order UFC PPV's, you have to subscribe to ESPN+.  But you dont get the PPV included (like the WWE Network).  You subscribe for $4.99 per month and that gives you the option to order the PPV for $59.99 through the ESPN+ streaming service.

Seems to have happened due to cable providers not willing to negotiate a better split of revenue for UFC (currently its 50/50 in most places, 60/40 in some but UFC wanted a bigger slice of the pie) and ESPN paying UFC a ton.

Edited March 19, 2019 by The Unknown Poster

[Brandon]

It would be fascinating to see how many people watch the PPV's in comparison between paid and people who stream illegally.  

I'd imagine the streaming would out weigh the paid customers by a wide margin. 

 

[The Unknown Poster]

25 minutes ago, Brandon said:

It would be fascinating to see how many people watch the PPV's in comparison between paid and people who stream illegally.  

I'd imagine the streaming would out weigh the paid customers by a wide margin. 

 

Thats a good question.  I dont know the answer but UFC has historically been very active in shutting down streams.  And I think, historically, people who want to watch PPV events, do so legally.

This move will definitely see fewer eyeballs on the UFC product, at least in the short term.  But presumably the revenue split is to UFC's advantage vs giving half to the cable companies.  And it's a win for UFC in the sense they know what they're getting in terms of ESPN paying them a lot of guaranteed money for the right to host the shows.  

But as you said, in terms of streaming illegally, I think the people that are used to that and comfortable with it fall more into the group that would find using ESPN+ easy whereas the larger PPV universe would include a lot of people that just dont know how to stream at all.  Even WWE still sells traditional PPV every month (which could be people who lack the ability to stream the network and perhaps some fans who just dont "get" the idea and dont bother learning).

But its another sign of the changing world of PPV from cable providers to streaming.  I know WWE was called crazy for doing it (and given where their subscriber count stalled, they probably should have kept the bigger PPV's off the network).  

It might be good for AEW on traditional PPV as they will gain the leverage UFC gave up by being one of the few events that can draw well on PPV so they might be able to get a good split of revenue.  But I would think AEW's audience would lean to people comfortable with streaming.

[bigg jay]

2 hours ago, The Unknown Poster said:

In a surprise move, UFC has ended traditional PPV in the US.

If you're in the US and want to order UFC PPV's, you have to subscribe to ESPN+.  But you dont get the PPV included (like the WWE Network).  You subscribe for $4.99 per month and that gives you the option to order the PPV for $59.99 through the ESPN+ streaming service.

Seems to have happened due to cable providers not willing to negotiate a better split of revenue for UFC (currently its 50/50 in most places, 60/40 in some but UFC wanted a bigger slice of the pie) and ESPN paying UFC a ton.

They've been talking about moving away from PPV for years so it's not really a surprise.  A lot of people expected them to move it to their fight pass service but if ESPN is willing to pay them to do basically the same thing, it's a no-brainer for them.  It sucks for fans in the US, because now it's an extra monthly cost for them.

[bigg jay]

41 minutes ago, The Unknown Poster said:

Thats a good question.  I dont know the answer but UFC has historically been very active in shutting down streams.  And I think, historically, people who want to watch PPV events, do so legally.

This move will definitely see fewer eyeballs on the UFC product, at least in the short term.  But presumably the revenue split is to UFC's advantage vs giving half to the cable companies.  And it's a win for UFC in the sense they know what they're getting in terms of ESPN paying them a lot of guaranteed money for the right to host the shows.  

But as you said, in terms of streaming illegally, I think the people that are used to that and comfortable with it fall more into the group that would find using ESPN+ easy whereas the larger PPV universe would include a lot of people that just dont know how to stream at all.  Even WWE still sells traditional PPV every month (which could be people who lack the ability to stream the network and perhaps some fans who just dont "get" the idea and dont bother learning).

But its another sign of the changing world of PPV from cable providers to streaming.  I know WWE was called crazy for doing it (and given where their subscriber count stalled, they probably should have kept the bigger PPV's off the network).  

It might be good for AEW on traditional PPV as they will gain the leverage UFC gave up by being one of the few events that can draw well on PPV so they might be able to get a good split of revenue.  But I would think AEW's audience would lean to people comfortable with streaming.

They might be active at it but they aren't very good at it.  You can find live HD streams for every event on reddit very easily and those never seem to get shut down.  There's no learning curve to that other than to no there might be a pop-up or two when you click on the link (that's usually even spelled out so people know ahead of time).

[The Unknown Poster]

2 hours ago, bigg jay said:

They've been talking about moving away from PPV for years so it's not really a surprise.  A lot of people expected them to move it to their fight pass service but if ESPN is willing to pay them to do basically the same thing, it's a no-brainer for them.  It sucks for fans in the US, because now it's an extra monthly cost for them.

Yeah I didnt buy that they'd move to fight pass.  They made way too much on PPV.  WWE had lower drawing PPV's that werent a big deal to do away with but they lost a ton of money by giving up WM and a couple others so quickly and easily.

I guess it depends what ESPN is paying them.  For a fan, its not any more money because they lowered the cost of PPV by the equivalent amount of the subscription cost.  But surely not all their fans have ESPN+.  They have 2 million subscribers so the potential to create more revenue for UFC.  UFC had one PPV over 2 million and several that were over or close to one million.  So yeah probably, if they feel their fans will transition to ESPN+, it could be a great deal.  If UFC only got half the $65 they charged for PPV, they likely get much more than half for the $60 charge through ESPN+.

I think WWE vastly over-estimated how many wrestling fans they had (they had crazy surveys results showing absurd numbers) but I think UFC events are more "must watch" as long as they continue to create stars and compelling fights.

[bigg jay]

31 minutes ago, The Unknown Poster said:

Yeah I didnt buy that they'd move to fight pass.  They made way too much on PPV.  WWE had lower drawing PPV's that werent a big deal to do away with but they lost a ton of money by giving up WM and a couple others so quickly and easily.

I guess it depends what ESPN is paying them.  For a fan, its not any more money because they lowered the cost of PPV by the equivalent amount of the subscription cost.  But surely not all their fans have ESPN+.  They have 2 million subscribers so the potential to create more revenue for UFC.  UFC had one PPV over 2 million and several that were over or close to one million.  So yeah probably, if they feel their fans will transition to ESPN+, it could be a great deal.  If UFC only got half the $65 they charged for PPV, they likely get much more than half for the $60 charge through ESPN+.

I think WWE vastly over-estimated how many wrestling fans they had (they had crazy surveys results showing absurd numbers) but I think UFC events are more "must watch" as long as they continue to create stars and compelling fights.

They already offer PPV on fight pass in some countries.  It's not like the WWE Network though as those events are not included in the price so you still pay the $60.  They could have done the same in North America but since ESPN is willing to give them a big fat cheque, they would have been dumb to say no.  The UFC has a 3rd party vendor running fight pass for them so there might have been so contract issues in play there as well.

It is an increase in price and it isn't.  They only started charging $65 in 2018 as it had been at $60 for years prior to that. That price is also only for those who bought the PPV in HD, as people who would only buy in SD are going from $55 to $65.

This doesn't just affect fans though.  Fighters, who get part of the PPV revenue, could also see their income affected by this if there is a significant drop in buys.

[Brandon]

They are not good at all at shutting down streams. 

I know a guy...  who knows a guy....  who has watched every UFC event in HD minimum 720p with no lag.   

I also know a guy who goes on popular MMA sites like Sherdog during the events and reads about how everyone is basically streaming off a stream on Reddit.....

 

 

[The Unknown Poster]

16 minutes ago, Brandon said:

They are not good at all at shutting down streams. 

I know a guy...  who knows a guy....  who has watched every UFC event in HD minimum 720p with no lag.   

I also know a guy who goes on popular MMA sites like Sherdog during the events and reads about how everyone is basically streaming off a stream on Reddit.....

 

 

I know a guy who knows a guy who got a cease and desist.  So they must be shutting down all stream.  

 

*sarcasm*  🙂

[sweep the leg]

TJ Dillashaw popped for peds this morning. One year suspension.

[bigg jay]

Interesting little tidbit came out about the ESPN PPV deal today.  The price is entirely of the PPV is entirely controlled by ESPN now as is the disclosure of the buyrate so it will be interesting to see if the price moves up or down at all.  The UFC won't care either way since they've already been paid.

[Brandon]

I wonder if and how this will impact some of the  bigger fighters who get a ppv cut? 

[JCon]

3 hours ago, bigg jay said:

Interesting little tidbit came out about the ESPN PPV deal today.  The price is entirely of the PPV is entirely controlled by ESPN now as is the disclosure of the buyrate so it will be interesting to see if the price moves up or down at all.  The UFC won't care either way since they've already been paid.

They'll care about buys when their sponsors wonder why not as many people are watching.