All fighters mentioned were on way stronger cards. Silva vs. Bisping and Joanna vs. Penne were headlining their shows, which were on fight pass to begin with because they were overseas and Fox Sports 1 don't want taped UFC. RDA vs. Alvarez was definitely a special case because of UFC 200 weekend, at no other time in the year would that have been on Fight Pass lol
I just see it as a missed opportunity. Cub is still ranked #5 in the world and Crusher is still ranked #14 and brings in the hardcore old school MMA fans. Put names on your main card, maybe bring in more ratings, which ups advertising revenue, which becomes a bargaining chip at their next negotiations. "Look at these numbers Fox, even our fight night show brought in good ratings to your niche sports network and upped your advertising revenue".
Every UFC I've been to the arena is like 1/4 full during those first couple of fights also. Not really a good look having your ranked fighters fighting in an empty building.
i get that, but they didn't have to have Silva vs Bisping or Joanna vs Penne over seas. that was strategic to help build fightpass. why would you put Silva on fightpass? why would you put him overseas to where you "have to" put him on fightpass? just like them putting Sage Northcutt on fightpass, even tho he aint big enough to have motherfuckers buy fightpass. everybody else was on stronger cards, but, there were smaller names fighting on those FS1 prelims, which effects advertising revenue. the first couple fightpass prelims had "no bodies", then they started putting more "no bodies" on FS1 to make room for a name they can highlight on fightpass. the only exception to that is 200.
We won't see numbered UFC pay per views on Fight Pass for years. Dana White has already clearly said hell no to that lol. Pay per view is like 90% of UFC's revenue. WWE started putting Pay Per View on their WWE Network because their average monthly pay per view buys started getting under 100k. UFC still does 300k+ almost every show (except for 125-145lb main events). UFC is still years away.
i know UFC wont do it anytime soon, but it's not like they'd lose money. out of $60 for a PPV, UFC only gets $30 of that. they would be able to stream those PPV's on fightpass and keep the whole $30. selling 300K on traditional PPV and selling 300K online would bring them the same amount of money, even if they charge half the price, $30. they would just end up selling more PPV's cus it'd be "affordable", so they would actually make more money. they'd have to upgrade their hardware to be able to host the streams with no fucks ups, but the extra PPV sales income they'd get (from it being half the price) would take care of that, or they can charge $35 and use those 5's to keep the system good. there's more money there if they were to go that route.
UFC knows what they're doing though I guess, they did just turned a $2 million investment in to $4 billion, just seems like a weird decision.
they can thank Rousey and McGregor for that $4B sale. 2015 was their strongest year ever. they wouldn't have been offered $4B if 2015 didn't happen. Cub should have been co-main, but they really want to shift shit to that fightpass eventually and they use these names to grow it little by little. kids nowadays use the computer/online more than tv's. i think they have a certain vision of fightpass that may not include PPV's, but im tellin you, PPV's on fightpass is where the money is. their live streaming currently sucks tho, just like WWE. kinda reminds me of the UFC episode of Silicon Valley, ironically.