UFC 203 Prelims Do Strong Ratings
This past weekend’s UFC 203 may be remembered for the crazy antics in the Fabricio Werdum/Travis Browne fight, the successful title defense of heavyweight champion Stipe Miocic and the professional MMA debut of CM Punk, but the preliminary card that aired on Fox Sports 1 held its own as well, which the ratings can attest to.
The rating for the Fox Sports 1 portion of the preliminary card and the event averaged 874,000 viewers, with the peak viewership number being 1,374,000.
The highest rating of 1,374,000 was for the Bethe Correia/Jessica Eye fight, while Drew Dober/Jason Gonzalez earned 590,000 viewers, Nik Lentz/Michael McBride earned 788,000 viewers and Caio Magalhaes/Brad Tavares earned 876,000 viewers.
Of the eight pay-per-view preliminary cards that had aired on Fox Sports 1 or Fox Sports 2 this year, the UFC 203 Prelims were the fifth highest among the eight.
The most memorable moment of the four fights that aired on Fox Sports 1 may have been the conclusion of the Bethe Correia/Jessica Eye fight. Correia won by split decision over the Cleveland, Ohio (where the event was held) native and proceeded to celebrate and dance around the octagon while she was being showered with jeers from the Cleveland faithful.
The UFC 203 pay-per-view itself is rumored to have drawn around 650,000 buys on the strength of the professional MMA debut of former professional wrestler CM Punk, who was tapped out by Mickey Gall in just over two minutes of the opening round of their fight.
