Clark Kent
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12-16-2009 04:10 PM:
Good news for fight fans in 2010 as the UFC is expanding its scope on "free" television. It's cable but you're not going to have to plunked down any extra dough for preliminary fights on the majority of pay-per-view cards next year. According to Spike:
"We’ve always had the ability to do fights on another network (aside from Spike TV) if we wanted to. We could do four per year. Versus has shown their commitment to mixed martial arts, the UFC, the WEC, and we couldn’t be happier to be in business with guys like this."
Comcast, the parent company of Versus, recently purchased of NBC making this deal especially interesting. MMAWeekly says:
Could the first Versus UFC card be Mar. 21 in Denver? Brandon "The Truth" Vera tweeted last night that he was fighting Jon Jones in Denver. That's a Sunday night. It kind of makes sense. Versus has done several Sunday shows in the past. In an odd twist, Vera quickly pulled the tweet.
Quotes via MMAWeekly
More...
Yahoo! Sports.
Cagewriter is an MMA blog edited by Steve Cofield.
After three well-rated telecasts in 2009, Spike TV has announced it will telecast 10 live "UFC Prelim" to precede some of the UFC’S biggest pay-per-view fight cards. The first two scheduled events will be UFC 108 on Jan, 2 at 9:00 p.m. ET and UFC 109 on Feb. 6 at 9:00 p.m. ET. The remaining eight shows will be announced at a later date.
Drawing an impressive average of 1.4 million viewers in 2009, the "UFC Prelims" on Spike TV feature between two and four live undercard bouts prior to the UFC pay-per-view telecast. Among those featured on previous "UFC Prelims" include former "The Ultimate Fighter" champions Efrain Escudero (Season 8), Kendall Grove (Season 3), and Ryan Bader (Season 8).
The UFC also announced two more full UFC cards on WEC-partner network Versus. Those will be "Fight Night-type" cards. Drawing an impressive average of 1.4 million viewers in 2009, the "UFC Prelims" on Spike TV feature between two and four live undercard bouts prior to the UFC pay-per-view telecast. Among those featured on previous "UFC Prelims" include former "The Ultimate Fighter" champions Efrain Escudero (Season 8), Kendall Grove (Season 3), and Ryan Bader (Season 8).
"We’ve always had the ability to do fights on another network (aside from Spike TV) if we wanted to. We could do four per year. Versus has shown their commitment to mixed martial arts, the UFC, the WEC, and we couldn’t be happier to be in business with guys like this."
Comcast, the parent company of Versus, recently purchased of NBC making this deal especially interesting. MMAWeekly says:
The New York Times reports that Comcast will likely rebrand Versus as something akin to NBC Sports Cable in direct competition to ESPN.
"You never know," White responded when asked by MMAWeekly.com about the impact Comcast’s NBC purchase could have on his company. "It’s obviously very, very interesting and Comcast and Versus have been great partners for us. They’ve got some interesting things going on."
When asked on today's conference call about the first Versus' show, Dana White and Versus' Marc Fein didn't have a date in mind. "You never know," White responded when asked by MMAWeekly.com about the impact Comcast’s NBC purchase could have on his company. "It’s obviously very, very interesting and Comcast and Versus have been great partners for us. They’ve got some interesting things going on."
Could the first Versus UFC card be Mar. 21 in Denver? Brandon "The Truth" Vera tweeted last night that he was fighting Jon Jones in Denver. That's a Sunday night. It kind of makes sense. Versus has done several Sunday shows in the past. In an odd twist, Vera quickly pulled the tweet.
Quotes via MMAWeekly
More...
Yahoo! Sports.
Cagewriter is an MMA blog edited by Steve Cofield.
