Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) was able to keep its head above water in terms of the preliminary card ratings for last weekend’s UFC 231 event in Toronto, which featured four mixed martial arts (MMA) bouts on FOX Sports 1.
Said bouts were good enough to pull 786,000 viewers, slightly above the 2018 average of 776,000, according to Dave Meltzer. That made the UFC 231 “Prelims” the third most-watched sports event on television last Saturday night behind the Lomachenko-Pedraza boxing match and the MLS Cup on FOX, which did 1,563,000 viewers.
No competition from college football likely played a role.
Nina Ansaroff’s unanimous decision win over former strawweight title contender Claudia Gadelha returned 915,000 viewers, whereas the pre-fight show averaged 211,000 eyeballs against 136,000 for the post-fight show.
For complete results of the UFC 231 pay-per-view (PPV) event, headlined by 145-pound champion Max Holloway’s dominant win over featherweight contender Brian Ortega, click here.