By now, it should be abundantly clear that the Saturday UFC on FOX specials are unable to draw blockbuster television ratings.
That failure to deliver is certainly assured–and exacerbated–when FOX broadcasts a card without a title fight on a date unable to benefit from in-season NFL promotion.
Saturday’s UFC show, which featured Robbie Lawler vs. Matt Brown in the main event, delivered a paltry 0.8 adults 18-49 rating with just 2.02 million viewers.
One of the weakest UFC on FOX broadcasts to date, the show narrowly bested the April 19 Werdum vs. Browne card, which drew a 0.8 rating and 1.99 million viewers in the comparable fast nationals.
Because the fast national rating only measures viewership from 8-10PM, it does not include a healthy portion of the main-event. If the main-event drew better than the show average, and it very likely did, the rating will receive an upward adjustment in the final Nielsen report.
Not designed to measure events that air live on the west coast, the fast national rating, meanwhile, includes data from whatever the west coast FOX affiliates aired between 8PM and 10PM PT. Since the show aired live there, the final rating will instead be based on what aired from 5PM through the end of the broadcast.
That adjustment should also boost the rating.
The upward adjustments will not, however, be enough to change the fact that a UFC show again drew a soft rating on FOX.
The broadcast, which also featured Bobby Green vs. Josh Thomson, Clay Guida vs. Dennis Bermudez and Anthony Johnson vs. Rogerio Nogueira, adhered to the following half-hour ratings breakdown:
8-8:30PM: 0.6 rating, 1.55 million viewers
8:30-9PM: 0.8 rating, 1.97 million viewers
9-9:30PM: 1.0 rating, 2.26 million viewers
9:30-10PM: 0.9 rating, 2.23 million viewers
*The 2.02 million viewer average is derived from Nielsen data that extends beyond two decimal places. That explains why the aforementioned figures do not precisely produce an average of 2.02 million.
Robbie Lawler defeated Matt Brown in the five-round main-event to earn a rematch against Welterweight Champion Johny Hendricks.