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Report: UFC Getting “200,000 to 350,000” PPV Buys

There finally are some credible figures about the number of pay-per-view buys of recent UFC shows being posted.

On the web site of Multichannel News, a leading trade publication covering the cable television industry, veteran journalist R. Thomas Umstead has written a piece called “Ultimate Fighting Pins PPV To the Mat”. It was posted Monday and can be seen at http://www.multichannel.com/article/CA6344723.html .

The article puts the number of households in the U.S. that viewed UFC 59, headlined by Tim Sylvia-Andrei Arlovski 2 and Tito Ortiz-Forrest Griffin, on April 15, 2006, as “over 200,000.”

The article also stated, “The UFC is averaging between 200,000 and 350,000 buys each for its 10 PPV events a year, according to PPV executives familiar with the franchise. UFC officials refuse to reveal specific figures.”

That would mean that after five years of owning the UFC, Zuffa has finally caught up with the number of buys UFC shows had in the mid-1990’s, before it was censored on American cable television.

According to Showtime Entertainment Television's report 'PAY PER VIEW: DECADE IN REVIEW” about 1990-1999, the five largest UFC shows on pay-per-view of that decade were:

Name - Date - Number of Buys - Main Fights
UFC V, 4/95, 240,000 (Dan Severn wins tournament, Ken Shamrock vs. Royce Gracie)
UFC IV, 12/94, 190,000 (Royce Gracie vs. Dan Severn)
UFC VII, 9/95, 190,000 (Marco Ruas wins tournament, Ken Shamrock vs. Oleg Taktarov)
UFC VIII, 2/96, 160,000 (Don Frye wins tournament, Ken Shamrock vs. Kimo)
UFC VI, 7/95, 150,000 (Ken Shamrock vs. Dan Severn 1, Oleg Taktarov wins tournament)


Read more here.