UFC Fight Night 105 and Bellator 172 both took place this past weekend and the ratings for the two shows have now been released.
Bellator 172 was first up on Saturday night and drew 807,000 viewers on Spike TV.
That’s an above average number for the promotion, which normally would be seen as a cause for celebration, but this had been marked out as a ‘tentpole’ event that Bellator CEO Scott Coker had been hoping might even peak with over 2 million viewers.
However, disaster struck just hours before the event was due to take place when the main event match-up between Fedor Emelianenko and Matt Mitrione had to be cancelled due to the fact that Mitrione was suffering from a kidney stone.
That no doubt had a major impact on the ratings, though a servicable replacement main event between Josh Thomson and Patricky Freire was installed on short notice.
Then on Sunday night UFC Fight Night 105 took place on FOX Sports 1, drawing 907,000 for the main card.
That’s down from the promotion’s last Sunday night event, UFC Fight Night 103 last month, which drew 1,090,000 viewers.
This past Sunday night’s show was headlined by a heavyweight encounter between Derrick Lewis and Travis Browne, backed up by a solid co-main event between Johny Hendricks and Hector Lombard.
