| While the UFC saw its pay-per-view numbers growing, there was still a vacuum to be filled, one that would provide the missing ingredient to catapult the UFC rapidly toward mainstream status.
Showing its cards on PPV meant that only the fans who paid for the events, either through In Demand or on a subsequently released DVD would be able to see them. But there was no “road show” where the UFC would take its live event to various locales around the country, as wrestling did, and there was not a significant presence on “free television,” which in modern parlance essentially means a broadcast or basic cable outlet.
The UFC remedied that situation by approaching Spike TV in 2004 with a time-buy, the organization was going to run a program that would include both competitive and reality elements. They called it “The Ultimate Fighter” and it made its debut on January 18, 2005. The show was an almost immediate hit, and it made sense. Spike TV was positioned as a network squarely aimed at an 18-34, predominantly male demographic and an association between itself and the UFC was a perfect fit.
The viewers were 70%-75% male. In the first season, the viewership got up to the two-million mark within twelve weeks.
That’s incredibly strong. And on October 10, 2006, during the Spike telecast, Tito Ortiz fought Ken Shamrock for the third time in an event televised live from the Hard Rock Casino & Resort in Florida. The numbers for that spectacle were staggering - that evening the UFC garnered a total of 4.2 million viewers, 1.6 million of which came in the coveted 18-34 demographic. In this category, it actually outdrew the American League Championship Series game between the Detroit Tigers and Oakland A’s by roughly 500,000 viewers.
To give you an idea of how the UFC has come full-circle, the U.S. Army was actually one of the advertisers on the program. You can’t get any more all-American than that, quite a change for a sport that was reviled just a few years earlier by elected representatives.
For Dana White, this was a great way for the audience to become acquainted with up-and-coming fighters as they climbed their way up the ladder. In that way, it became a lucrative “feeder system” in creating new stars.
The way it worked was this - fighters would get housed together, not unlike the reality TV program “Survivor.” They would live together, eat together, train together, but then they would ultimately compete against each other. They get divided up into two teams, each of which is coached by a prominent UFC fighter. They conduct matches which are, officially speaking, “exhibitions” (the show is headquartered in Las Vegas, so it is the Nevada State Athletic Commission that has jurisdiction over the proceedings).
The eventual winner of the competition is crowned “The Ultimate Fighter” (hence the name) and is rewarded with a multi-fight contract with the UFC. This is not to say that those fighters who do not win do not get to compete in the UFC; after all, having built their personalities, there is great relevance in using them in future promotions and programming. But they do not get the same deal as the winner.
The Ultimate Fighter quickly became a flagship program for Spike, and it was a win-win proposition, because it introduced the UFC to a new audience and brought its fighters closer to the fans than ever before.
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