Sounds like it plus frontrowbrian says it's happening. Rumor has it coming out next summer.
The network would take the place of Speed Network and directly compete with ESPN. It will have 40 MLB games, a Sportscenter type show and a host of other sports including UFC.
No clue what this means for Fuel or FX.
I'll tell you what it means, it means FOX wants UFC off of FX asap.
frontrowbrian was killing UFC on twitter all day, making great points. The FOX move has pretty much been a failure. TUF was already dying and is now pretty much dead. UFC on Fuel, no matter how Dana spins the demos, has to be considered a failure. Yes, those shows do better than what was airing on Fuel previously, but that's not as impressive as it sounds because Fuel was essentially airing stuff that literally nobody was watching, and UFC has not met expectations. The UFC on FX shows have also fallen well below expectations, to the point FOX is shifting the shows to the new sport only network where the ratings expectations will be lower.
And then we have UFC on FOX. Aside from the debut, where 9 million people saw a 90 second fight & one of the weakest looking heavyweight KO's in combat sports history, and no doubt millions of new eyeballs were left with a "
this is the big bad UFC?" feeling and have never came back, the rest of the shows have done no better than EliteXC or Strikeforce did on CBS. UFC on FOX has proven that to the big ticket audience of network TV, the UFC name means absolutely nothing. Its all about stars, and the only way to pop ratings on FOX is to give up PPV main events with real stars.
Now they will move to Fox Sports 1. Spike reached 100 million homes. Fuel & Fox Sports 1 reach far less.
So was leaving Spike the right move? On one hand, Zuffa is being paid very high rights fees by FOX, and have the prestige of being able to say they are on prime time network TV. On the other hand, ratings are down from the Spike days, and being on FOX has not helped PPV, which by any measure is either flat or down depending on how you look at it. Has UFC really grown since the FOX deal?
frontrowbrian made a great point when he said UFC went from being the big fish in the small pond to the opposite. Spike let them do whatever they wanted, including look for premium cable deals. They can't do that now. Plus, FOX will treat them like any other entity that doesn't produce, because the are way behind NFL, NASCAR, MLB, etc in the pecking order of properties. Moving UFC to Fox Sports 1 is the first crack in the glass. FOX is paying a lot of money for UFC, they want results.
