For the second week in a row, the UFC television programming on FX did average ratings.
On May 18, it was for a live show from Santa Catarina, Brazil, where a card headlined by Vitor Belfort vs. Luke Rockhold, did 1.33 million viewers.
This past Saturday, the prelims for UFC 160 from Las Vegas, headlined by Mike Pyle’s split decision win over Rick Story, also did 1.3 million viewers. The two-hour show also featured Khabib Nurmagomedov setting UFC’s all-time takedown record in a win over Abel Trujillo.
Dating back from when the soon-to-be ending UFC relationship with FX started in January 2012, both live main cards as well as the prelims before pay-per-view shows and FOX specials have both averaged 1.3 million viewers.
The pay-per-view itself saw Cain Velasquez stop Antonio “Bigfoot” Silva to retain the UFC heavyweight title, while rival Junior dos Sanos scored a third round knockout over Mark Hunt. While there is some correlation between ratings of prelims and pay-per-view numbers, they are generally not that good a predictor of how the pay-per-view will do.
There are four UFC events left on FX before the events transfer to Fox Sports 1. The remaining dates are prelims before UFC 161 on June 15, prelims before UFC 162 on July 6, prelims before a FOX special on July 27 and prelims before UFC 163 on Aug. 3.
All the UFC programming that had formerly been on FX, as well as some that had been on Fuel, will be moving to Fox Sports 1 upon the debut of the new network on Aug. 17. UFC programming will anchor the debut night in prime time with a live special from Boston.