UFC president, Dana White is very pleased with the early UFC 264 pay-per-view buyrate numbers.
In the main event of the PPV card, Dustin Poirier and Conor McGregor had their highly-anticipated trilogy fight. The scrap was less than seven months after Poirier knocked out the Irishman on Fight Island in January. Ahead of the event, McGregor was back to his usual trash-talking self which hyped up the fight.
Also on the UFC 264 card was a pivotal welterweight clash between Stephen Thompson and Gilbert Burns in the co-main event. Sean O’Malley also made his return in the PPV opener which only added to the hype of the event.
Now, after UFC 264, White says the early numbers for the PPVs are very good. However, he says it will take about a month to get the full numbers.
“I have to be careful with this stuff now that we’re a public company – I can’t go shooting my mouth off and have it be completely wrong,” White said at the UFC 264 post-fight press conference. “But I’m going to say we came in anywhere between 1.7 and 1.8 million.”
If the 1.8 million is the right number, that is no doubt massive for the UFC. Ever since the promotion went to ESPN+, the PPV numbers have gone down as fans need to get ESPN+ to buy the PPV. However, this just proves how big of a star McGregor is, as his rematch against Diaz did 1.6, while the Eddie Alvarez fight did 1.3 million.
Ultimately, despite the trilogy fight at UFC 264 supposed to be the ending of the rivalry, when Conor McGregor returns, there’s no doubt the next fight will be big on PPV. If it is the fourth scrap against Poirier, it would likely be around that 1.8 million number again.
Are you surprised by the projected UFC 264 PPV buyrate revealed by Dana White?
