SCRAPP! FIGHT MAGAZINE
July - 2016
13
That said, the promotion is
still struggling, and it shows.
Last weekend’s Bellator 157:
Dynamite 2 proved it, espe-
cially following the release
of ratings numbers that
were anything but inspir-
ing. Instead of a crushing
win in viewership, some-
thing expected with names
like Rampage Jackson, Matt
Mitrione, and Michael Chan-
dler on the card, the results
were lukewarm: an average
of barely over 600,000 view-
ers tune in, with viewership
peaking at just over a million
sets of eyeballs in the main
event.
That’s not good. Not good at
all. Bellator’s average show
does somewhere in the
range of 650,000 — and Dy-
namite 2 may be their most
stacked card of the year. No,
the main event of Jackson
vs. Ishii wasn’t what we ex-
pected, but fans didn’t know
that going in. And Mitrione’s
debut, and Chandler vs. Pat-
ricky Pitbull, should have
drawn more eyeballs then it
did.
So, what’s the problem?
It may be two-fold. One,
MMA fans don’t seem to
be sold on the whole MMA/
kickboxing hyrbid format, no
matter how in love Bellator
CEO Scott Coker is with the
idea. The kickboxing portion
of the card fizzled, and Bel-
lator really needs to rethink
any more of these outings
before moving forward with
another. If nothing else, they
kill pacing: imagine if Chan-
dler’s knockout of the year
contender win over Pitbull
came immediately after Mi-
trione’s comeback win. Sud-
denly, you’ve got people tun-
ing in and sticking around,
instead of saying “well I’ll
just come back for the main
event.”
That’s just speculation as to
the cause, but it’s a strong
possibility. Another may
be the bad press Bellator
took following their last big
“tentpole” event, Slice vs.
Dada 5000 in February. Be-
tween that and the horren-
dous Ortiz vs. Bonnar tent-
pole, fans may be having a
once bitten, twice shy mo-
ment with the promotion’s
“big” cards. Coming out of
Dada and Slice, one man
(Dada) nearly died, and had
no place being in the cage
to begin with. Months later,
the other did die, when Slice
tragically passed away after
being informed he needed a
heart transplant.
So what does the number
two MMA promotion in
North America do in this sit-
uation? It sounds like “stay
the course” is the plan, but
truth be told, it’s not a very
good plan.
No, what Bellator needs now
is legitimacy. They need to go
back to pushing homegrown
talent, and do away with
the freakshow main events.
Those may have worked in
the short term, but the public
is wise to the quality (or lack
thereof) that all too often
accompanies those bouts.
Now, names like Chandler,
Straus, Curran, Warren, King
Mo, and others are more
important than ever before.
And they can be accented
with the legitimate pickups
of names like Thompson and
Henderson.
The heavyweight division
needs to be sorted out as
well. As does Bellator’s wom-
en’s divisions, which seem to
be an afterthought at this
point.
In any case, as much as the
promotion is a major play-
er in the free agent market
right now, they need to get
better at putting on solid
fight cards. Hopefully, a les-
son was learned from Dyna-
mite 2: gimmicks won’t do.
Stick to MMA, stick to solid
fights, ditch the freakshows
and cross-promotions with
other sports.
