Ultimate Fighting coverage

For me, the real story of UFC isn't event coverage of whether John "The Defecator" Smith can defeat Mike "Ultra Manly Warrior" Jones. It's not about writing "Wow, there were 10,000 people here, so this is a legit SPORT!"

For me, the story that would resonate regarding UFC, and the story that most belongs in the newspaper is a discussion of whether or not boxing sees it as a threat (apparently it does, according to that other recent thread Inky_Wretch started). And a further discussion of the roadblocks a sport like boxing would put up against UFC with the help of its politicians and its decades of history.

Also, what type of things are done to those ends? This didn't happen, but as an example, the same ownership runs both Staples Center and Home depot center. HDC has boxing events, Staples had a UFC event. What's to prevent someone from saying "hey, if you put on that UFC event at your other venue, we'll pull our boxing events from your places."

Simple event coverage will always only reach a niche audience, like Xgames stuff. But something that delves into the business of it, something that investigates any machinations to keep it down and keep UFC from getting a piece of the revenue pie . . .that is a story I know I would be very interested in reading.

 

There are 1,000 people at minor-league baseball games on 60 different nights. There are 1,000 people at UFC once every six months to a year.

That's one key difference.

Additionally, I'm not sure your UFC crowd is much into reading the newspaper. In fact, I'm not entirely sure that UFC fans can read.

 

Bruce, are you really suggesting these street fights get coverage in a newspaper? I mean, as a sporting event, and not in something like Hattori suggested.

 

<sigh>

Inky is right. We have this discussion every month.

The main problem is the preconception a lot of newspaper people have of the UFC -- a notion reinforced in this thread -- that is not based in reality.
People think they have an idea of what the UFC is based on what it was marketed as 10 years ago or some local tough man/"cage" fighting event that was held at their local VFW. Again, this is like judging the quality of Major League Baseball as a local pickup game, comparing the MSL to the NASL or condemming the NBA over the fact that fights always break out at the local blacktop hoop games.
As far as interest, I love the idea that, "well, the ufc crowd doesn't read newspapers." And we wonder why newspapers are dying. Instead of trying to reach out to new audiences, we're limiting our coverage to the generation that still live and die on newspapers -- a readership that gets smaller every year.

As far as numbers go, I'll just say this:
An event gets a crowd of between 13K-14K live. (That's at Vegas, I don't know what the Staples Center drew).
Buyrates are comparable for mid- to upper-level boxing cards. Not Tyson numbers, but not bad.
There are 12 PPVs this year, not once every six months.
The "Ultimate Fighter" finale live show on fX two years ago had at one point 2.6 million viewers for the cards final fight. They have also begun to host other live, non-ppv shows on cable TV, much like boxing's old Tuesday Night Fights.

 

<sigh>

1. Newspapers are not dying for quite a while. You and I will both be out of this business by the time it happens.

2. Yes, we can add some readers by bastardizing ourselves to quasi-sport. At what point do we become no better than the supermarket tabloids?

3. I only know what I see, and what I see is quasi-sport.

4. There is some problem in dictating your coverage by TV and attendance figures. As in, will the cross-section of people attending or watching the event: a) read the paper on a regular basis, and b) be the target demographic for your advertisers?

 

I'm not arguing that we dictate coverage by attendance figures.
I'm pointing out that a lot of people don't cover sports based on misinformation or faulty logic.

Sorry, newspapers may not be "dead." But they'll be increasingly irrelevent if we base our coverage on "those people don't read the paper anyway."

Tell me, what, other than one has a longer history, is the difference between boxing, wrestling (Olympic-level, not WWE) and the ufc?

 

Maybe I'm guilty of looking at it the same way as pro wrestling. And I know it's not fake.

 

I just got into watching UFC a few months ago when the Ultimate Fighter 3 came on and now I'm hooked. The last two PPV events have been sellouts and the tickets range from $100-1,000 each. Whether it's a sport or not, I don't know. But I do know it's getting more and more popular every year. Guys like Matt Hughes are getting endorsement deals, the PPVs and TUF shows get good ratings and restaurants show UFC matches just like they would boxing or wrestling.
UFC is definately not what it was 10 years ago and guys like Dana White, Ken Shamrock and Royce Gracie will tell you that. If anyone thinks UFC is a tough man competition or bar fighting, they are wrong. I suggest at least checking it out once berfore making your prediction.
The Ultimate Fighter 3 finals are Saturday on Spike Tv and and the next PPV is July 8.

 

Well, that's it.

I'm going to start a petition calling for the Florida High School Athletic Association to make this a prep sport.

 

As I have in every other UFC thread, I'll point out that UFC doesn't do a good job of making it easy to get results into the paper.

The PPVs run too late and most SEs aren't going to hold a page just to get in the results of a niche sport. Hell, we don't hold for most championship boxing events, so why would we for UFC?

 

What an faulty leap in logic.
Just because it's a sport okay for adult involvement doesn't necessarily mean kids should do it.
And just because kids can't -- or shouldn't -- do it, doesn't make it not a sport.

I don't see any states running high school boxing championships.