It was dubbed “the biggest UFC fight in history,” and while the long-awaited rematch between UFC middleweight champion Anderson Silva and the boisterous Chael Sonnen was able to shatter a live gate record, it would appear that UFC 100 remains king in the realm of Pay Per-View. While 148 drawing around 1 million Pay Per-View buys is by no means a failure and still a momentous occasion for the promotion, UFC President Dana White is reportedly disappointed that they were not able to top the 1.5 million that UFC 100 posted, according to Dave Meltzer.
Dana, realistically, has little to be upset about as the 1 million mark is a very successful number for the event. While the middleweight title rematch had a lot of steam behind it, one must remember that UFC 100 featured two of the biggest draws in the promotion’s history as Brock Lesnar and Georges St-Pierre, not to mention that both had title defenses on the milestone event.
While the UFC President may not be enthralled with the high number, the current state of the UFC’s drawing power took a hit with Lesnar’s retirement from the sport and GSP sitting out with injury for over a year now. A buyrate of 1 million for Anderson Silva defending his UFC Middleweight Championship against Chael Sonnen is by no means a disappointment, nor should it be looked at that way as drawing those numbers has become increasingly difficult over the past two years.
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For all the buildup Dana White should be unhappy. Take into consideration the fact that buyrates overall were higher in 2009 then currently, and you can see why they had so much riding on 2 million buys….
50 million net for ppvs alone, on an event which featured Sonnen (who got submitted by maia not long ago) and yet another tito/forrest fight shoved down our throats (and tito coming in having lost 4 of 5 fights), is not bad at all. Not a bad pay day for the four guys in the last two fights and cung le if he also got a cut of that ppv money. No wonder my boy forrest says has a couple of fights left in him ;)
it took two men (lesnar and gsp) to draw 1.5 million views, while it only took one man (anderson silva) to draw 1 million viewers… yeah i wouldnt complain dana, lets book silva more and raise his cotract pay… lets go gsp vs silva, jones vs frank mir and lets put frankie vs jose aldo, now thats a hell of a ppv buy lol
Silva didn’t sell this card by himself. You can’t deny the amount of shit talking from Sonnen helped sell a chunk of those million buys. Silva vs Okami did 300,000 buys, and Silva vs Belfort (which also had Griffin, Franklin and Jones) did 700,000. This is the first Silva headlined card to hit 1,000,000, and there’s no doubt Sonnen had a huge hand in that.
So you’re saying Anderson Silva sold the show himself??? Gimmie a break!!! I would say that Silva AND Sonnen sold the show, but IF you wanted to narrow it down to just 1 man selling the show, I don’t see how anyone could disagree that it was CHAEL SONNEN who completely sold this show!!!
I agree with Dana’s theory that Chael and Anderson didn’t sell the fight, their first fight did.
@jesse
Exactly, I know I would not want to see a rematch if their first fight looked like their second.
@ A : I was about to say the same thing Chael had a ton to do with how much this fight sold especially since he completely dominated silva for 24 minutes in their first fight
And this is why the UFC loves Sonnen, and why he is such a genius. He helped the UFC make tens of millions on ppv and got a fat chunk himself. Now he’s setting himself up to be rich his whole life, and always have a job on Fox doing broadcasting. This is coming from a guy who had lost like 9 fights pre UFC, 3 to Jeremy Horn alone, and basically made it to the UFC by default after they bought WEC, and even then got submitted in his first fight to someone who now fights in 170 lol. And now he is UFC and tv gold. And he lost the rematch and more people love him than over haha. I guess he is a true American Gangster.
Btw heard he’s thinking about making a move to lhw…perhaps he has a run in mind in order to meet one Bones Jones? ;)
Chael is going to be on UFC tv for a long, long time after his fighting career is up.
Devin, if that happens Bones will beat him just like Anderson did last weekend…except possibly even worse. Besides, a step up would only make him an average sized lhw…the advantage he often had at me would disappear…
@frantzfanon
I agree chael(or anybody besides a HW) fighting jones will be next to impossible to pull off a win. But chael is probably bigger than rashad and he beat almost everybody at 205. So a run through the current less than stellar 205 division isn’t out of the question.
@mikemac:
Rashad Evans is the notable exception, because you are right he is only 5’11″. But I can’t see Sonnen even beating a Phil Davis or a Ryan Bader.
Granted, Sonnen had a horrible cut-down the night before weigh-in for 48…losing 20 lbs. overnight is crazy, I don’t care what condition you are in. I just can’t think of anyone he could beat at 205–least of all Rashad–that would advance him to title contention….
*148*…
@frantzfanon
Rashad is the best guy at 205 (besides champ) and he has KO power that chael lacks. I think chael is better at using his fundamentally sound boxing to set up his take downs. I see him beating a lot of guys at 205 because there are only a handful of really good wrestlers. IMO chaels power double is one of the best in UFC and a lot of 205ers would have difficulty with the pace he sets(especially if he only has to go for 3 rnds). If he were to go to 205 I’m guessing a promotable fight would be with machida if machida stops Bader.
@mikemac:
Sonnen v. Machida, that I can realistically see. And such a great styles contrast! The real question would be could Sonnen even get close enough to put his skill set to work…
and still no numbers released on 147? i’ve been wanting/hoping to find out it bombed bad.
those have been #’s have been non-existent from what I have been able to find and I have the numbers recorded since UFC 34. Projections were around 150K but no final numbers have been seen anywhere.
i guess dana somehow managed to silence those in the know!
i guess the ufc execs know what the numbers were, and that’s what’s important. i just want to know that they got the message!
I was definitely joking about Sonnen beating bones, not because I don’t think Sonnen wouldn’t have a -wrestlers chance” (ohh! you see me..haha) against Bones, but because its not an easy thing to string together enough wins to get title shot in any division, let alone the talented lhw class. Of course I would expect bones to win that fight, but it’d be great to watch a top notch wrestler (try to) put bones on his back for once. Also I don’t think Sonnen would be a small 205er, I think he’d be an average size one (he’s bigger than bonnar).
I really don’t see Sonnen hanging around 185 at this point, so I think we’ll get to see how he does back at 205 soon enough. I think he has a suspect chin so he’ll have to go on one hell of a good run basically implementing his wrestling game perfectly in every fight to make his way to the top. Then in the next near or so spider will retire and perhaps he’ll drop back down and make his last run to win a title, as promised to his late father.