Last Friday night was one of the few times this year that the UFC and Bellator MMA went head-to-head with each other on cable television. FS1 aired The Ultimate Fighter 26 Finale, while Spike broadcast Bellator 189 from Oklahoma. Both featured women’s championship fights in the main event, with minimal name value scattered throughout the main card, and the end result was not a lot of people tuning in to watch either event.
The Ultimate Fighter 26 Finale main card averaged 501,000 viewers, with a rating of 0.2 in the 18-49 age demographic. In the main event, Nicco Montano bested Roxanne Modafferi to become the UFC women’s flyweight champion, but the three-hour broadcast did not even crack the top-50 for the 18-49 demo.