The ratings are in for ‘The Ultimate Fighter’ Season 17 premiere and shows that an average of 1,512,000 viewers tuned in to Tuesday night’s two-hour episode, resulting in an 0.8 ratings amongst adults 18-49.
That makes it the highest rated TUF show on FX to date, though it should be noted that this kind of figure would have been average at best during the program’s long run over on Spike TV.
The ratings improvement suggests that the move from Friday night’s may well prove to be a good move for the show, though I don’t feel that 1.5 million is the kind of number that’s going to have FX and UFC execs cracking open the bottles of champagne in celebration.
It’s a reasonable start, but nothing more than that and it has to be stressed that there’s a long way to go and often times the numbers will drop after the premiere.
I’m curious to see if the change in format for the season opener to give a more documentary style feel with more backstory for each fighter will prove to be a positive in terms of retaining viewers for future episodes, or if the apparent lack of conflict between the big-name coaches Jon Jones and Chael Sonnen will be a turn-off.
