From MMAJunkie.com
While Showtime executives do not traditionally release ratings figures, early estimates for this past week's "Strikeforce St. Louis: Heavy Artillery" event put the average Showtime viewership at 308,000.
While some MMA pundits have declared the figure a failure and a sign that Strikeforce's deal with the premium cable channel may be in trouble, sources close to the partnership indicated to MMAjunkie.com (www.mmajunkie.com) that quite the opposite is true.
While quarter-hour figures, which often rise during mixed martial arts events, were not released, the sources indicated that the "Strikeforce St. Louis: Heavy Artillery" broadcast peaked during the main event of Alistair Overeem vs. Brett Rogers with 448,000 viewers.
That figure represents a 45 percent increase over the current average viewership figure. With Overeem competing in the U.S. for the first time in two-and-a-half years, much of the interest was likely in favor of Brett Rogers, who received a great deal of exposure in his CBS-broadcast matchup with Fedor Emelianenko this past November.
The night's co-main event featured Antonio Silva vs. Brett Rogers, two fighters who have also competed in high-profile fights for Strikeforce, as well as their previous employers.
Spike TV officials proudly announced on Tuesday that the special the basic cable channel ran in a counter-programming slot, "UFC's Ultimate Fights," averaged 894,000 viewers.
While the figures would seem to indicate a whitewash for the UFC, Showtime officials apparently do not agree. With the premium cable channel available in only 18 million homes compared to approximately 98.6 million homes for Spike TV, Showtime officials are reportedly pleased with the figures.
In short, as Showtime Sports Director of Communications Chris DeBlasio told MMAjunkie.com following this past August's "Strikeforce: Carano vs. Cyborg" event, comparing numbers between Showtime and Spike TV is a difficult proposition.
"I wouldn't say it's irrelevant, but the only fair way to compare the UFC's show on Spike vs. the show that we did on Saturday is to compare apples to apples, which is to compare our ratings points in our universe vs. the ratings points in Spike's universe," DeBlasio said in August. "You know what those numbers are, and you know what the difference in viewership is. But when you compare, our rating was higher than their rating. That's based on the ratio of subscribers that we have and based on the ration of subscribers that Spike has. As far as (Showtime vice president) Ken (Hershman) and all the executives at Showtime are concerned, that's a ratings win.
"[Ratings] are a great guide and a benchmark to see what our subscribers like and don't like, but we don't live and die by them. That's for advertising-based networks. They have to sell their product to advertisers. We have to sell our product to subscribers."
Showtime executives were not immediately available for comment when contacted by MMAjunkie.com.
{308000/18000000, 894000/98600000}
Showtime = 1.711% | Spike = 0.9067%
1.711%-0.9067% = 1.711/100-0.9067/100 = 0.008043 = 0.8043%
Showtime wins, by 0.8043%!
"The night's co-main event featured Antonio Silva vs. Brett Rogers, two fighters who have also competed in high-profile fights for Strikeforce, as well as their previous employers."
wat?
"That figure represents a 45 percent increase over the current average viewership figure."
What do the headlining fights for the other Showtime shows typically do over the average?
orcus - "That figure represents a 45 percent increase over the current average viewership figure."
What do the headlining fights for the other Showtime shows typically do over the average?
not sure, you rarely get the peak numbers for Showtime, even the CBS show they gave the peak numbers for Fedor/Rogers, Kimbo vs Whoever but not for Hendo/Shields
Only other 1 I remember was for Gina/Cyborg were they averaged in the 520k range and the show peaked at almost 900k which was really good
Carano vs Cybborg numbers
'The event averaged 576,000 viewers on the Showtime cable network. It peaked with 856,000 viewers for the night's main event between Carano and Santos'
Wow Brett Rogers was busy that night, main-eventing, and co-main-eventing against Silva.
Props to MMAJunkie for actually trying to explains the ratings game in clear terms and providing some detailed numbers. Does anyone know if the ratings for the main event portion of the Nashville card were ever released? Last time I checked only the first two hours were available
It's about time Junkie put the ratings in perspective. Showtime's reach = 17 million homes/Spike TV's reach = 98 + million homes.
Percentage wise, Strikeforce kicked UFC's ass which is understandable because Strikeforce was a live event and UFC was a collection of past fights.
"Fedor vs Oveerem = 4,000,000 views minimum."
Let's not get crazy
standupwarrior - It's about time Junkie put the ratings in perspective. Showtime's reach = 17 million homes/Spike TV's reach = 98 + million homes.
Percentage wise, Strikeforce kicked UFC's ass which is understandable because Strikeforce was a live event and UFC was a collection of past fights.
Of course % wise. Showtime has fewer people to few it. We can also bring up the SNL that night and compare numbers as well. Does not matter what the % is. The actual people to view it, the total draw, and compared to recent views is what matters.
Comparing apples to apples is saying what SF did now and previously.
What they did was compare apples to a fucking watermelon, then count the seeds and divide by the size of the fruit.
already been said, but... yes... showtime gets less viewers "period" ... so it's really not bad
now if that was a CBS show... another story