TUF 3: The Thread

[Adam 0]

Crowning the first Lightweight Champion on a Spike show, plus a Rich Franklin title defense would rake in a great number.

[Guest Brian]

I still want a sixteen-man, four-coach lightweight tournament on TUF. Arlovski and Sylvia, Hughes and GSP. You get the benefit of building up two PPV title matches, plus putting a spotlight on the lightweights, and you can reasonably keep the teams seperate until the semi finals (one team member in each of four brackets), and finally, instead of offering up one contract, you can payout a large lump sum to the winner (Like, $250,000 at least would be the sum value of both of those contracts).

[Damaramu 0]

And what is it with fighters dipping? Seems like they all do it and a bunch of guys at the gym I work out at do it too.

[Your Paragon of Virtue 0]

Dude, I don't know. I can't even verify that.

 

Frank Trigg lost in a minute at the last ROTR PPV, and apparently Charuto lost pretty badly in the second round. Trigg hinted at retirement, pretty strongly, as did Charuto.

 

Really sucks, I was really hoping for trigg to have a resurgance in his career. If true, the first time I can say that I've seen one of my favourite fighters retire.

[RavishingRickRudo 0]

I hear that the Hammer House enjoys Ranch while Team Quest is more Sweet and Sour. AKA? Honey Mustard.

[Lord of The Curry 0]

I can just picture Sims, Coleman and Randleman sitting around chatting while enjoying some carrot sticks and ranch dip.

 

Swick and honey mustard? Oh, don't even go there.

[Lt. Al Giardello 0]

I'm hearing rumors that the TUF 4 is suppose to have previous fighters that had success in the UFC(Frank Trigg, Ricco Rod, etc.) and help them restructure their career.

[RavishingRickRudo 0]

It would be odd to have that concept and then have coaches. They would need someone like Miletich as a coach (also with the comeback story) and, like, Frank Shamrock.

[Guest Brian]

Trigg sounds like he's finished after losing in the first round to Condit via triangle, who lost to Shields in the finals. Otherwise, I kinda like the idea because it'll allow Lindland to whomp on some guys and build up some of that swank personality for a title shot.

[Lord of The Curry 0]

Trigg lost to Condit, not Shields.

[RavishingRickRudo 0]

*"Ultimate Fighter 3" bounced back from last week and did a 1.9 rating on Thursday night. "Unleashed" featuring Royce Gracie did a 1.4.

 

- LAW

 

1.9, fuck yeah! This is the weirdest viewing audience. You think Tito/Forrest had anything to do with it? Or was last week just a blip? Granted, we haven't gotten the full picture and can only speculate from just three ratings, but damn, I'm confused.

[naiwf 0]

*"Ultimate Fighter 3" bounced back from last week and did a 1.9 rating on Thursday night. "Unleashed" featuring Royce Gracie did a 1.4.

 

- LAW

 

1.9, fuck yeah! This is the weirdest viewing audience. You think Tito/Forrest had anything to do with it? Or was last week just a blip? Granted, we haven't gotten the full picture and can only speculate from just three ratings, but damn, I'm confused.

 

The only thing I can think of is that I forgot the 2nd episode was on until 10 to 15 minutes into it, and only recognized that it was on because I saw this thread get bumped. I think a lot of people knew the season premiere was happening after the live fights so they were able to tune in based on that. Since I don't watch much on Spike TV, I didn't see any ads, and it took a week to remember that TUF is on Thursdays at 10 with no lead in. I think it was a blip caused by forgetfulness more than anything else. Now that people are "locked in" so to speak with the schedule I'd guess that the rest of the season should be between 1.5 - 1.9 with the finale about a half a point better on both ends.

[RavishingRickRudo 0]

That's an interesting point. I watch SPIKE (relatively) a lot so, to me, it's like they are advertising it all over the place, when I guess it's just on that one channel.

[Guest Brian]

This is good, because it probably means it was just a readjustment to the move that hurt them in the second week. Makes TNA's rating look worse, considering what they did last week with a worse lead-in.

[Adam 0]

I'm gonna smash his face in

 

[Lord of The Curry 0]

The look on Bisping's face is one of minimal surprise combined with a certain amount of expectation.

[Adam 0]

Yeah, almost as if he's non-interested, as he knew it was coming.

[starvenger 0]

The look on Bisping's face is one of minimal surprise combined with a certain amount of expectation.

Doesn't "The Count" own a victory over Ross?

[Lei Tong 0]

Yeah, but it was only via silly submission.

[Lord of The Curry 0]

Damn those! They always just seem to creep up on poor Ross.

 

Looking forward to seeing Matt and Bisping face off this week.

 

*Matt signs "Fuck you" to Bisping*

 

Bisping: Whawas that? Are you taking the piss?

 

*Matt signs "Go to hell limey"*

 

Bisping: Oh, you're definetly taking the piss. Tito, ya best hold ya golden boy back 'fore me fists give 'im a good rogering.

[starvenger 0]

Shouldn't there be "trollop", "miserable little toerag" and "git" be in there somewhere?

[Rendclaw 0]

I think Regal has those trademarked.

 

I wasn;t impressed by this past episode, because the more shit Ross talked the more I knew that he was going to get beaten, and badly beaten at that.

 

I'm just not feeling this season. While I am personally glad that the "truce" happened (because as I said before, it was taking away from the true purpose of the show), no one on either team with the possible exception of Herman (and he hasn;t done much to this point, it seems that its all rep at this time) really captures my interest.

 

After watching some of Unleashed, it was amazing to me just how bad the production value was in the beginning. and I hate to say it because to some this might be sacriledge, but watching Royce Gracie fight was rather boring to me. I'm glad that BJJ, while highly effective, is just one of the techniques that some fighters learn, and not the be-all end-all that it was back in the beginning. Any of you guys in the know care to tell me why that is?

[Your Paragon of Virtue 0]

All styles can be effective/boring depending on the fighter. It was boring then because Royce had a lot of pressure on him and probably took the safe route in order to make sure he won. He also had fights against people much bigger.

 

For a more exciting style of BJJ, watch Minotauro.

[RavishingRickRudo 0]

At the time, Royce Gracie was near-god. After seeing UFC 2 over a decade ago, me and my buddies stopped trying to do sharpshooters and camel clutches on each other and started doing guillotine chokes and armbars. The sense of "no one can beat this man", that we may get with Fedor or Liddell today, was the feeling every time Gracie stepped into the octagon times 10. The mystique that the UFC put on the Gracies was just, I've never seen anything like it (even if it was pretty much all fictional).

 

Basing his fights just on Unleashed is a bit unfair. You have to see the whole events to get the aura and importance of Gracie.

 

And BJJ is still one of, if not thee, most important martial art to study. For offense, but more importantly, for defense.

[RavishingRickRudo 0]

ULTIMATE FIGHTER REBOUNDS IN WEEK THREE RATINGS

 

After an alarming ratings drop the previous week, The Ultimate Fighter 3 rebounded to a strong 1.9 overall rating with its third episode on April 20th. The show had previously drawn a 2.0 rating in its season premiere, and then fell off drastically to an overall rating of 1.3 for Episode Two. The increase to 1.9 for Episode Three must come as a huge sigh of relief to Zuffa and Spike TV just one week after the biggest week-to-week ratings drop-off in the history of the series.

 

In the key demographic of 18-to-34-year-old males, Episode Three drew a 3.0 rating, which is a big improvement from the 2.3 rating that Episode Two drew in that demographic. However, it still falls far short of the 3.7 rating that the show's season premiere drew in that demographic.

 

One Big Reason for the Ratings Increase: Boosts from Specific Age Groups

 

When a TV show's ratings go down gradually over time, the reasons are usually fairly simple. People tend to lose interest in TV series as time passes, or they get turned off by certain things in the series and don't want to watch it anymore. It is much less common for a TV show's ratings to go down drastically one week and then go back up drastically the next week.

 

In examining why the ratings for Episode Three rebounded in such a manner, one of the first things to jump out is the fact that the show's ratings in two specific age demographics went up in Episode Three, to the point that they were actually higher than Episode One's ratings in the same demographics.

 

In the 35-to-49-year-old male demographic, Episode One drew a 1.7 rating, Episode Two was down to a 1.1 rating, and Episode Three was up to a season-high 2.0 rating.

 

Similarly, in the 18-to-24-year-old male demographic, Episode One drew a 1.9 rating, Episode Two was down to a 1.7 rating, and Episode Three was up to a season-high 2.3 rating.

 

If it weren't for these two specific age groups, the overall rating for Episode Three would not have been much higher than the disappointing rating that was drawn by Episode Two. It was these two specific demographics that figuratively carried the show on their back to bring the overall rating back up to the high 1s.

 

In the specific age group that has supported UFC programming on Spike TV more than any other age group, which is 25-to-34-year-old males, the ratings for Episode Three are still nowhere near what they were for Episode One. Episode Three drew a 3.4 rating in that demographic, which is still far short of the record-breaking 5.0 rating that Episode One drew in that demo.

 

 

 

Another Reason for the Increase: Huge Lead-In Rating for Royce Gracie Retrospective

 

The most simple and direct reason for Episode Three's ratings increase is the fact that the most recent episode of UFC Unleashed gave TUF a much bigger lead-in audience than it had the week before. The April 20th episode of UFC Unleashed, which was a look back at the career of Royce Gracie, drew an overall rating of 1.4, which is huge for UFC Unleashed and may very well be a testament to the drawing power of Royce Gracie.

 

To put into perspective how big of a deal it is for UFC Unleashed to have drawn a 1.4 overall rating, that actually equals the 1.4 overall rating that The Ultimate Fighter 2 averaged over the course of its twelve-episode run. An overall rating of 1.4 is actually higher than the 1.3 overall rating that TUF 3 drew with its second episode. An overall rating of 1.4 is barely lower than the 1.6 overall rating that the UFC drew with a two-hour live fight special on April 6th.

 

It's a little bit crazy for hour-long retrospective shows to be drawing ratings similar to those drawn by first-run TUF episodes or even live UFC fight broadcasts. The apparent TV viewer interest in Royce Gracie has to be seen as a positive by Zuffa when it comes to what kind of PPV buy-rate UFC 60 is going to draw, especially since ticket sales for the event have been slow (at least compared to the last several UFC PPV events).

 

 

 

Positive or Negative Word of Mouth, and Audience Growth Throughout Episode Three

 

Unlike the first two episodes of TUF 3, the third episode showed significant growth in its ratings throughout the episode. Episode One back on April 6th remained steady in its ratings throughout the 90-minute broadcast, with quarter-hour ratings of 1.9 or 2.0 for all six quarter-hours. Episode Two only had mild growth in its audience as the show went on, with a 1.2 overall rating for the first half-hour and a 1.4 overall rating for the second half-hour.

 

On the other hand, the ratings for Episode Three went up significantly as the show went on, with the first 15 minutes drawing a 1.6 rating, the second quarter-hour drawing a 1.7 rating, the third quarter-hour drawing a 2.0 rating, and the final 15 minutes of the show drawing a 2.3 rating. This is most likely due to the fact that the scheduled fight was established early in the episode, and the rest of the episode was focused on building towards that fight.

 

The vast majority of the people who were watching at 10:00 PM stuck around for the entire episode, and when you combine that with the fact that new viewers are typically tuning in at various times throughout any given episode of a TV show, that's what leads to the aforementioned quarter-hour ratings growth during the course of an episode.

 

However, even with the audience growth during the course of Episode Three, it is still the case for this series (and the vast majority of TV series) that the buzz from episode to episode actually centers on the previous episode of the series. This is a notion that holds up when one examines the week-to-week ratings changes during the first two seasons of TUF.

 

If a significant percentage of the people who watched Episode One of TUF 3 were disappointed with what they saw, that would likely not be reflected in the ratings for the first episode. It would be far more likely to be reflected in the ratings for the following week's episode, since the people who were disappointed by the first episode would be far less likely to tune in for Episode Two.

 

On the same token, if the people who watched Episode Two liked what they saw for the most part, that would probably not be reflected in the ratings of Episode Two. It would be far more likely to be reflected in the ratings for the following week's episode, as the people who enjoyed the show talk about it at the proverbial water-cooler the next day (or the next week), and positive word of mouth spreads in the days leading up to the debut of the next episode.

 

With that in mind, it has to be considered a strong possibility that many of the people who watched Episode One of this season were disappointed with what they saw (perhaps by the drunkenness of what is supposed to be a group of professional athletes, or perhaps by the first episode's constant refrain of, "Tito Ortiz and Ken Shamrock really, really hate each other! No, I mean it! They really do!" or perhaps by any number of other factors), and therefore many of those people didn't come back to watch Episode Two.

 

It also has to be considered a strong possibility that many of the people who watched Episode Two liked what they saw enough to tell their friends or co-workers about it in the subsequent days, and many of those friends and co-workers tuned in to see part or all of Episode Three.

 

As with any episode of TUF or any television series in general, the ratings for Episode Four of this season of TUF will be determined in part by which group of people is greater in size--- the group that was disappointed enough in Episode Three to have lost some or all of their interest in the series, or the group that enjoyed Episode Three enough to talk about the show with their friends or co-workers.

 

 

 

Network TV Competition Not Likely to Have Stolen Many Viewers from TUF's Third Episode

 

Episode Three of TUF 3 went head-to-head with a fairly weak night of network TV competition. In the 10:00 PM to 11:00 PM hour on April 20th, CBS' Without a Trace led the way with an overall rating of 11.5, which is much lower than usual due to the fact that the show's CSI lead-in was a repeat.

 

ABC's Commander in Chief continued to struggle on its road towards a possible cancellation with an overall rating of just 5.2, which is down drastically from the 10+ overall ratings that the show was drawing in its first several weeks on the air. Finally, a repeat of ER on NBC drew an overall rating of just 4.3, which is less than half of what ER normally draws with its new episodes (ER repeats generally don't hold up well in the ratings).

 

Either side of the argument could easily be made on whether the network TV competition has any significant effect on TUF's ratings. It's true that TUF draws from different viewer demographics than Without a Trace or Commander in Chief, but TUF certainly does draw from many of the same age demographics as ER. ER is supported primarily by 18-to-49-year-old viewers, which is also the general age demographic that Spike TV targets with The Ultimate Fighter.

 

The pro wrestling show TNA Impact, which airs Thursday nights at 11:00 PM on Spike TV and is now relying on TUF to provide it with a big lead-in audience, drew an overall rating of 0.9 on April 20th, which was down from the April 13th episode's overall rating of 1.1. While TNA certainly can't put on the kind of risky, high-impact match every week that they had at the beginning of the April 13th show, the April 20th rating still has to be considered hugely disappointing for TNA because its lead-in audience was actually much bigger on April 20th. In just one week, TNA Impact went from retaining a strong 85% of TUF's overall rating (1.1 compared to TUF's 1.3), to retaining just 47% of TUF's overall rating (0.9 compared to TUF's 1.9).

 

By: Ivan Trembow

MMA WEEKLY

[Your Paragon of Virtue 0]

I'd say wrestling is most important to study. A wrestler with a little bit of submission training is more likely to be successful than the opposite.

[RavishingRickRudo 0]

I would not disagree with that. Wrestling is probably the best way to control a fight, and where the fight goes, so in regards to being a successful fighter, it is important to learn. But I think, in regards to general MMA, you have to know more about BJJ than you do about wrestling.

[Your Paragon of Virtue 0]

I don't know about that, I mean most fighters at the top of the list these days are more standup grapplers aka wrestlers. Fedor is more of a standup grappler than a submission guy on the ground. Ditto for Chuck, and Shogun wants to keep the fight on the feet most of the time. Matt Hughes and GSP are more wrestlers than pure BJJ guys. Same goes for most of the LW.

[RavishingRickRudo 0]

I am not talking about what you need to be a top guy, though. I am talking about what you need to know more-of to even compete. If Fedor didn't know anything about BJJ, he would have been subbed by Nog in the first round. It's like the alphabet to MMA. You just have to know it on a fundamental level more than you do wrestling. Obviously, if you want to make it to the top levels of the sport, you have to know everything and being a great wrestler is a huge advantage and a lot of todays most successful fighters a very good wrestleres, but IMO, if you had to choose between BJJ and Wrestling to be aware of, BJJ would take it pretty easily. That was pretty much decided early-on in MMAs development.

[Angel_Grace_Blue 0]

Did Bisping break open Kristian's skull?