The UFC APEX facility was there to âsave the dayâ when the promotion needed a place to stage fight cards during COVID-19. But what started as a temporary fix has slowly evolved into a full-time solution for the worldâs largest (and richest) MMA promotion, which can save boatloads of cash by eliminating travel costs.
Just donât expect any high fives or butt slaps from combatants like Kevin Lee.
âI wish it was in front of more fans,â Lee said during the UFC Vegas 76 media day (watch the replay here). âI donât know how many people are gonna be at APEX but itâs kinda stupid, I donât know what weâre doing, you know what I mean? The pandemicâs over, I donât know if people got the message, if they sent out the telegram. I donât know what weâre still doing here. I get thereâs money to be had but itâs kinda stupid.â
Lee (19-7) parted ways with UFC back in late 2021 and made a quick pit stop at Eagle FC, claiming a decision victory over fellow UFC export Diego Sanchez. âMotown Phenomâ would later re-sign with the Endeavor-owned promotion and will make his return against Russian welterweight Rinat Fakhretdinov this Sat. night (July 1) at â you guessed it â APEX in Las Vegas.
Home to ârich-ass motherfckersâ like Mark Zuckerberg.
âItâs a different energy when itâs thousands and thousands of people screaming, itâs a different level of feeling,â Lee continued. âItâs why when I want fights like the Charles Oliveira fight again, itâs a different feeling. I wish that was happening but Iâm gonna make do with what I do. Iâm gonna go out there on Saturday in front of the two, three hundred rich-ass motherfckers who wanna see me bleed and we gonna get it in.â
Apex sucks
Only good thing is the smaller octagon, forces action
It just shows that the UFC is small time. Imagine a big sport pulling that nonsense.
Lol yeah. NBA doing basketball games at a high school gymnasium they rented out
Boom Went The dyno Mite
It shows that the HNICs are cheap bitches. If they have fights at the apex, some of the money saved should be split between the fighters. Nobody wants to fight in front of no crowd. They made it to the big stage and then they put the big stage in a warehouse.
Garbage mother fuckers man. All about that profit margin and not enough about the people earning you said profit. UFC can eat a dick.
Itâs a public company on the stock market.
So get used to it. Will only get worse.
Investors matter way more than the fans do. If fighters want a raise they should start buying up the new stock I guess.
Was going to comment, has anyone even considered the idea that maybe they cannot fill arenas for all these shit cards they put out?
Iâm glad that Lee thinks heâs a sell out star here but does anyone really think even half the Apex cards would bring bigger audiences with a bigger gate at bigger venues?
Every other major sport has shit teams with zero support and they play games in front of 90% empty arenas and stadiums.
UFC as it matures is no different. The worst of these apex cards would be a disaster unless they sold them dirt cheap which they would never do. UFC commands a premium dammit!
So do people prefer empty arenas to the apex?
The UFC are robbing ESPN blind by having events in their back shed.
Do they move the spare car parts and junk out the way each time or just throw a tarp over it ?
Why would you say that?
ESPN gets 13 PPVs per year and pays for other broadcast rights. UFC is required to put on so many events per year for ESPN so theyâre doing the opposite of robbing by doing the events.
Unless you are saying nobody will watch ESPN if itâs showing the apex?
If Iâm Dana Iâm booking all the fights on "Motown"s current contract at the Apex
Hmmmmm Interesting too . Audience provides the ambiance and excitement. Or Not .
Fight Nights werenât even selling out back in 2018-2019. I vividly remember those cards out in bumfuck NY and Wisconsin that wouldnât sell out with anywhere from 50-75% of the venue being filled. Itâs still a better vibe than the apex cards, but there is some validity to the claims people make that it simply isnât profitable enough to take these events to some of the smaller markets. Something like scarcity could lead to guaranteed sell outs when they hit spots like Austin/Nashville/Jacksonville (or close to it) and they save the expenditure when they throw on cards like that Holly Holm main event shit show that could ultimately see them losing money on the actual event/ticket sales.
I went back and took a look at some of Kevin Leeâs main event fights from back in 2018/2019 actually.
Al Iaquinta vs Lee 2 at the Fiserv Forum in Milwaukee, 17,385 capacity for basketball, only 9,010 tickets sold for an mma event that includes floor seats that basketball games donât have the room for.
RDA vs Lee in Rochester, NY at the Blue Cross Arena, 8,132 tickets sold in a venue that holds 13k.
Very well could be that when you include hotels, plane tickets, transportation costs for equipment/staff, they sometimes lost money on these road events that simply didnât sell at the levels that they were expecting. At the apex, they have their own static venue, an athlete hotel which they own nearby and they keep all their employees in Vegas where they donât have to pay their airline and hotel fees when they go to bumfuck, USA.
Itâs important to note that the UFC has adjusted to a business model where they make $2 for every $1 that they spend and it appears theyâve done so by keeping these shit apex cards in Vegas where they cut costs and bank on guaranteed ESPN money, the degenerate gamblers and people like myself who will watch regardless of the shit they put on.
If you want things to change, just stop watching apex cards and get the guys holding the money (ESPN) to force the UFCâs hand.
It needs to go, like over a year ago already. Its such a bad look for whats supposed to be a major sports promotion.