In an interview dated from last month, UFC President Dana White explained that with the new broadcast deal with the FOX broadcast network, that the prelim fights on Facebook would end and that FOX would televise all undercard fights.
News of the change was noted by BloodyElbow.com who transcribed an interview from ElOctagono.com. You can check that interview out on Youtube, with the Facebook talk beginning at 3:36.
Interviwer: One thing we’ve noticed recently is the Facebook fights. Is that going to continue with the ongoing Fox deal, or is that going to go away with the prelims and all that stuff?
Dana: Yeah it will go away when the Fox deal starts, which is in January. Because all that programming now, I mean the reason we did the Facebook fights was because nobody could see those fights. So we put them up on Facebook as an option for fans, because we always love to give more fights. But with the fact that Fox wants to pick up all these fights, they’ll be on television now.
This will certainly increase the exposure of the Ultimate Fighting Championship to the casual fan, as well as increasing the earning capacity of fighters who will now have their fights televised on live television.
I’m certain that there is a loyal fanbase that will be disappointed in the transition and FOX will have to juggle their lineup to include the 3 hours of pre-event programming.
Fans will just have to wait to see how this all plays out.