10 Legendary MMA Fighters You've Probably Never Heard Of

Varying Definitions of Success for Elite XC: Primetime

Elite XC sent out a press release early this morning trumpeting their ratings success on Saturday night’s CBS offering. They boasted “triple digit percentage increases” when compared to the network’s season average for that time slot, as well as strong ratings about the “key young adult” and male demographics.

The inaugural CBS ELITEXC SATURDAY NIGHT FIGHTS mixed martial arts event, live from Newark N.J., led the Network to demographic victory and significant time period growth among all key young adult and young men demographics from 9:00-11:00 PM, according to preliminary Nielsen live plus same day ratings for Saturday, May 31.

The 9:00-11:00PM portion of CBS ELITEXC SATURDAY NIGHT FIGHTS (2.7/05, 4.30m) was first in adults 25-54 (1.9/06), adults 18-49 (1.9/06), adults 18-34 (1.9/07), men 25-54 (2.6/08), men 18-49 (2.5/08) and men 18-34 (2.6/10).

Those ratings only cover 9-11 pm, the release pointed out, which excludes what they expect to be the highest rated portion featuring the Kimbo Slice-James Thompson bout. Those numbers should be available on Tuesday. And if you happen to live in the 5% of the nation where the show was pre-empted by the “Children’s Miracle Network Telethon”…yeah, tough luck.

While Elite XC and CBS seem happy with those numbers, not everyone was pleased with the outcome. One dissenter in particular found his way on to ESPN to debate the topic, though he might be just slightly biased…

(Okay, the video is screwing up our layout, so just go watch it here)

Bryan Burwell of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch is troubled “beyond belief” by the sport, which he compares to Thunderdome, and Dana White tries to simultaneously make the case against Elite XC and for MMA.Of course, he then denies that he was attempting to draw a UFC-Elite XC comparison, simply because he “didn’t even mention their name.” That, right after saying that what we saw on CBS on Saturday night was “horrendous.” Smooth.

(Props: Five Ounces of Pain)

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Iron Dragon- June 9, 2008 at 10:30 pm
Strippers dressed like cheerleaders, a fixed main event, an extremely overrated Kimbo Slice, and Gary Shaw...what an idiot. I will never watch EliteXC again.
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Kel- June 2, 2008 at 5:35 pm
edit: a ton more than boxing...


P.S. - nice Camel toe!
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Kel- June 2, 2008 at 5:33 pm
C-bus has an excellent point..On yesterday's "Rome is Burning", Jemele Hill (sp?) made a comment to the effect of: MMA is a sport where people are just trying to bash each others heads in with no strategy, not like boxing. She clearly does not have any idea about the sport itself, just what she has heard. Rome quickly demonstrates that he has a bit more knowledge and lets her and the viewers know that there is definitely a ton, if not more, strategy in MMA...Check it out if you can...
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C-Bus Allstar- June 2, 2008 at 12:46 pm
Jesse, I think you underestimate the natural (and unnatural) ability of Urijah Faber. He hits as hard as Chuck Liddell, is faster than Clay Guida, and has a wrestling ability comparable to BJ Penn*. This kid has it all, and uses it all EXTREMELY well. Pulver was tentative because he didn't want to get his head knocked off by a straight right (which he did a couple times and almost got knocked out for it). If I were in Pulver's shoes, I would have done the same thing. E.g. biding my time until I could utilize my main weapon (left hook). Faber just never gave him the chance.



*Note: I said his WRESTLING was comparable, not his BJJ. No they aren't the same thing. And if you say that wrestling and BJJ are the same, you're an idiot.
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Jesse- June 1, 2008 at 9:44 pm
Pulver dissappointed me by having no tenacity whatsoever in that fight unless he'd gotten cracked in the face first. It was not what I expected. Fixed? No. Unimpressive on the part of Pulver? Yes
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Elk Snot- June 1, 2008 at 6:47 pm
My favorite of all is that the Pulver-Faber fight was a fix. Yup, it was on an ESPN message board so it must be true. Plus, it totally explains how come the fight was so epic and went all 5 rounds. Pulver was paid to take it easy and pull his punches because Faber doesn't have a ground game.

The veins in my neck looked like Thompson's ear after reading that one.
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Elk Snot- June 1, 2008 at 6:39 pm
Wow, the comments over there are priceless. Apparently "this will go from TV to PPV in a hurry". Ya know, since most MMA fights are shown on network TV.

In addition "MMA is checkers, boxing is chess". Which I agree with, if he's referring to Chinese checkers in 4 or 5 dimensions, and I think he was.

And "who wants to watch people try to grapple who don't know how to wrestle". I guess all those Olympic medals and D-1 championships don't really mean anything, after all.
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C-Bus Allstar- June 1, 2008 at 6:20 pm
I hate all these half-assed journalists and writers that take this opposing position to MMA just to get their name on a few more lit screens. It's horseshit. MMA is NO MORE VIOLENT THAN BOXING, and BOXING has been on Television for how many years? OH THAT'S RIGHT, SINCE BEFORE PEOPLE COULD FUCKING AFFORD TV'S.
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DonnyG- June 1, 2008 at 5:58 pm
John:

You called it man Butterbean vs. Kimbo in August.
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Thomas- June 1, 2008 at 5:35 pm
What about the key 18-34 WAG of MMA fan demographic?
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john- June 1, 2008 at 5:19 pm
Elite XC just lost a viewer. That was the worst officiating ever. Kimbo took 19 unanswered headshots and the ref stopped it while JT was standing? Kimbo? HA Butterbean beat him fair and square in under a minute. What does that say for Kimbo?
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Alex- June 1, 2008 at 5:17 pm
Dana didn't really do himself any favours there. One of these days he's going to learn that you don't always have to come out swinging
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Vegas- June 1, 2008 at 5:13 pm
Damn, that long ass comment I typed up got deleted when you reposted this.
0 0 Reply
bpd- June 1, 2008 at 5:04 pm
Seriously, Burwell. After all we've been through, can't we all just get... (ahem)

Beyond Thunderdome?
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