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2008-07-10 21:09:49
The UFC Keeps Sticking It to Their Competition
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Dana White keeps trying his very best to bury his competition before it even gets a chance to get off the ground.
The UFC recently announced that they will be airing UFC 84: "Ill Will", in full, for free, on Spike TV at 9 pm on July 26th. What is the significance of this date? It's the same night as the next edition of EliteXC's "Saturday Night Fights". The UFC announced that they will be showing UFC 84 back to back - once at 9 pm EST, and again at 11:30 pm EST. This will top off a full day of MMA programming on Spike TV, as the UFC also plans on showing UFC Fight Night 14 again during the afternoon.
UFC 84: "Ill Will" was likely the best PPV of the year so far. It featured B.J. Penn dismantling Sean Sherk to retain the light heavyweight title, Tito Ortiz's last fight in the UFC (against Lyoto Machida), and the first round knockout of Keith Jardine by Wanderlei Silva. I'm not surprised that the UFC would choose to air this PPV for free on Spike TV - it was certainly one of the best of the year.
This continues the UFC's strategy of putting up their own programming to directly compete with another promotions event.
When EliteXC had their first "Saturday Night Fights" event , the UFC put together a "Chuck Liddell" block of programming and aired it on Spike TV.
Then the UFC announced that they would be airing UFC Fight Night 14 for free on Spike TV, the very same night that "Affliction" was going to be running their first PPV event. Dana White decided to tantalize hard-core MMA fans by featuring Anderson "Spider" Silva in the main event of the card. Not only that, but fans get the added attraction of seeing how Silva does in his move up to light heavyweight. The UFC is centering their entire advertising campaign for this event around Anderson "Spider" Silva, a clear attempt to try and keep MMA fans from shelling out their hard-earned dollars on the "Affliction" PPV.
As if this wasn't enough, the UFC then announced that they would be showing UFC 84 for free on Spike TV, to again directly compete with EliteXC. The upcoming "Saturday Night Fights" card will not feature any "big" names such as "Kimbo Slice" or Gina Carano, so clearly Dana White is hoping that the show bombs in the ratings. Any severing of the relationship between CBS and EliteXC due to low ratings would be a crippling blow for the upstart promotion - clearly Dana White is intent on burying EliteXC before it has a chance to get off the ground.
I'm all for competition - I think that it is a very good thing for the sport. Fighters will get paid more, and the sport will receive more mainstream exposure. However, I also don't have a problem with Dana White doing what he can to make things difficult for his competition. That's what business is all about - he isn't doing anything unfair, he is just using the resources that he has available to make sure that he maintains the number one spot. I can't fault him for that.
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