Is MMA one of the most popular sports in USA?

Top 4 ball sports, then Nascar, WWE, soccer, tennis and boxing/mma
It’s still a fringe sport that’s watched by less than than 5% of the populace
 
Kyojiro said:
I seriously doubt soccer. I can't name one American player.
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But there are more Americans who can't name one MMA fighter. Right now more Americans are following the Women's World Cup than have ever watched an MMA fight. I was surprised myself, but the networks make their ratings public.

Mia Hamm and Hope Solo both have huge name recognition in America (particularly among young women) compared to MMA fighters.
 
Wrestling is a cultural thing in American high schools and colleges.

Bisping Cohost Rattlesnake Gomez : What else is a 170lb semi athletic male going to do for sport? Too small for football or baseball
 
AnotherOldGuy said:
But there are more Americans who can't name one MMA fighter. Right now more Americans are following the Women's World Cup than have ever watched an MMA fight. I was surprised myself, but the networks make their ratings public.

Mia Hamm and Hope Solo both have huge name recognition in America (particularly among young women) compared to MMA fighters.
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The world cup is in a once in 4 years event that takes place over a month. Is it really comparable?
 
ferrisjso said:
You aren't wrong. I just don't think that determines a sports popularity if anything it shows the sports popularity is dependent on stars. Look at boxing and the weak skeleton once you peeled away the sports biggest stars? Look at the UFC's numbers when you take away Conor's numbers? Was the sport really more popular in 2015 when him and Ronda were breaking records and everyone else couldn't draw flies or 2012 or 2013 when every champ above 145 could draw good numbers though records weren't falling. I have the sense tennis used to be more popular than it was now, that's just my anecdotal experience though it's in good shape but tennis was never based on one star, you've always had about a half dozen. With golf though it's success was heavily dependent on Tiger Woods(at least recently), that's why it was the first sport where the video game was named after an athlete(Madden's named after Madden but Madden ain't some superstar that's just bizzare). Tennis is probably a bigger long term rival though cause I see golf as a really tough sell for future generations, even to rich kids.

Well Canada is a fundamentally regional sport. With the "NHL" "national" actually refers to Canada not the US and the sport's most popular in the Northern United States. Was at a school with a big time hockey program and you notice unlike football and basketball the big schools are all located in the Northern United States(like North as in geography not Civil War North, places that are freezing) and the kids who play tend to be be predominantly Canadian. NHL is only relevant for part of the country but it's very relevant to that part. It doesn't need to die everywhere else, it's already dead and it doesn't matter cause it's a niche thing. NHL has expanded south but they've tended to focus on cities that don't have other sports teams if you're in Nashville and San Jose you might not give a fuck about hockey but if it's the only game in time you might. The UFC though can spread so much further.

Hockey tends to be popular on the least densely populated parts of the planet(Scandanavia, Canada, Northern US, Russia) so it's healthy cause those people love it but there just ain't that many of them. UFC appeals to the whole US. Hockey is a team sport and is direct competition for basketball, football and baseball, UFC it really isn't an either or thing, MMA fans aren't going to ditch other sports, but being a team sport fan is pretty time intensive, people usually are only into one maybe two at a time. And appealing to more places globally matters in the US too because then immigrant communities spread it.
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I agree hockey interest is very regional in America (if we're talking about the world, then every sport but soccer is regional).

However, there are enough hockey fans in the northern United States that it generates far more money than the UFC (average salary in the NHL is over a million a player, with 20 American teams of 20 players each). There are 400 hockey players supported by American fans that make over a million a year salary (many making over 5 million a year) - compare that to the revenue of the UFC. And then you have college hockey and the like, which also outdraw MMA.

Imagine the UFC having forty events a year in each of twenty American cities, and making enough to pay 400 fighters over a million a year for doing so (that's just American based players and teams) -- that's what it would have to do to match hockey. And of course that's small compared to baseball, basketball and football.

In terms of golf, its not just Tiger Woods -- several of the highest paid athletes in the world are golfers. I'm guessing its because so many actually play golf -- people tend to follow what they themselves play. The golf industry (equipment & courses and spectator) is much bigger than MMA -- ordinary people think nothing of dropping several hundred dollars into a single putter or driver (beats me why, not a golfer -- how hard can it be to make a good putter?). You might be right about it dying off though.
 
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Kyojiro said:
The world cup is in a once in 4 years event that takes place over a month. Is it really comparable?
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That's a fair point, though even the MLS draws more than the UFC, and then you have the parents watching their kids soccer games, total spectators for soccer will be a lot higher than for MMA.
 
mmacasualviewer said:
Wrestling is a cultural thing in American high schools and colleges.

Bisping Cohost Rattlesnake Gomez : What else is a 170lb semi athletic male going to do for sport? Too small for football or baseball
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I didn't think baseball players had to be that big. They have to be extremely gifted with hand-eye coordination and timing though. Doesn't matter how fast or strong or coordinated you are, without the hand-eye coordination you're never hitting big league pitching.
 
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TS, you were this close to be true. (It's not MMA, but its ultimate incarnation, WMMA. :D)
 
No. Anytime I go to a restaurant or bar and it's on TV everyone keeps saying, whoa what's that, or ohhh those people are beatin the hell outta each other. Casuals
 
From media and advertisement market point NO.
There, for example NHL and NBA are quite known more than 25 years. Long playing timeframes, interrupts, plenty of space for advertisement companies and sports betting industry developed approach to them more than 25 years ago.
Another sports, where long discussions and team sport games also are popular and delivers wievership for advertisement industry.
 
AnotherOldGuy said:
I agree hockey interest is very regional in America (if we're talking about the world, then every sport but soccer is regional).

However, there are enough hockey fans in the northern United States that it generates far more money than the UFC (average salary in the NHL is over a million a player, with 20 American teams of 20 players each). There are 400 hockey players supported by American fans that make over a million a year salary (many making over 5 million a year) - compare that to the revenue of the UFC. And then you have college hockey and the like, which also outdraw MMA.

Imagine the UFC having forty events a year in each of twenty American cities, and making enough to pay 400 fighters over a million a year for doing so (that's just American based players and teams) -- that's what it would have to do to match hockey. And of course that's small compared to baseball, basketball and football.

In terms of golf, its not just Tiger Woods -- several of the highest paid athletes in the world are golfers. I'm guessing its because so many actually play golf -- people tend to follow what they themselves play. The golf industry (equipment & courses and spectator) is much bigger than MMA -- ordinary people think nothing of dropping several hundred dollars into a single putter or driver (beats me why, not a golfer -- how hard can it be to make a good putter?). You might be right about it dying off though.
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I don't think the UFC, tennis or individual sports are really all that regional. In the US every other team sport besides hockey isn't regional for better or worse. Hockey though is nothing in much of the country and is number one at the northern edge. College football I guess kind of counts, that tops everything in the deep south(though it's also big in the Northwest it ain't number one or anything). College hockey might not outdraw MMA because there's so few schools that have it. I was bragging to people about my schools success once and I was like "we're number 2 or three out of all the schools in the country" Don't remember the number but I looked it up and it was embarrassingly low.

UFC also is unfair to their stars, so how many millionaires or multi millionaires(better to say that a million bucks is almost nothing nowadays, an average worker makes that in their life you're just streamlining it through a shorter career, nothing to brag about). They are more fair to their lower level fighters cause they are the ones who will replace the expensive fighters if the expensive fighters leave. That's why UFC gets trashed over paying out a lower share of their revenue cause this is the best way to exploit the most with the least PR blowback as there will be few stories of people suffering in poverty than in boxing which Dana makes sure as hell to talk about whenever someone asks him about this. The UFC or any for profit corporations/subsidiary success isn't based on how much you pay your employees, it's total revenue, UFC is just more exploitative than these sports that have unions(UFC won't have a union cause situation above makes it almost impossible to get fighters to agree on their interests cause they by design are different).

Compare the total revenue to the team sports not how wealthy they make their athletes. Also look how many shows they put on. A basketball team puts on 82 shows per year,plus the playoffs, baseball twice that. UFC might have watered down their cards to a ridiculous degree but how many cards does the company put on all year? You ain't going to compete with businesses putting on more shows than you unless you charge a lot more. You can make a healthier profit or income per event with a smaller business if you're putting on less shows(actually since less events means more demand maybe that's even more likely, look at live baseball attendance for example, crickets don't use cash).

Team sports also got a shit ton more ways to make money. They have more established more lucrative TV deals, they have numbered jerseys while the UFC is a skins sport(you can't wear someone's skin as a jersey or their face as a hat, that sounds trivial but that fact makes a HUGE difference, team sports have so many different ways to make money than the UFC or an individual sport does). What are you going to sell at a UFC store? Generic stuff with UFC on it? Like I know they prolly get creative(and the Reebok deal was part of that) but they can't work around the fact you can't market apparel in a sport where people are wearing basically none(at least not the way other sports do).
 
ferrisjso said:
I don't think the UFC, tennis or individual sports are really all that regional. In the US every other team sport besides hockey isn't regional for better or worse. Hockey though is nothing in much of the country and is number one at the northern edge. College football I guess kind of counts, that tops everything in the deep south(though it's also big in the Northwest it ain't number one or anything). College hockey might not outdraw MMA because there's so few schools that have it. I was bragging to people about my schools success once and I was like "we're number 2 or three out of all the schools in the country" Don't remember the number but I looked it up and it was embarrassingly low.

UFC also is unfair to their stars, so how many millionaires or multi millionaires(better to say that a million bucks is almost nothing nowadays, an average worker makes that in their life you're just streamlining it through a shorter career, nothing to brag about). They are more fair to their lower level fighters cause they are the ones who will replace the expensive fighters if the expensive fighters leave. That's why UFC gets trashed over paying out a lower share of their revenue cause this is the best way to exploit the most with the least PR blowback as there will be few stories of people suffering in poverty than in boxing which Dana makes sure as hell to talk about whenever someone asks him about this. The UFC or any for profit corporations/subsidiary success isn't based on how much you pay your employees, it's total revenue, UFC is just more exploitative than these sports that have unions(UFC won't have a union cause situation above makes it almost impossible to get fighters to agree on their interests cause they by design are different).

Compare the total revenue to the team sports not how wealthy they make their athletes. Also look how many shows they put on. A basketball team puts on 82 shows per year,plus the playoffs, baseball twice that. UFC might have watered down their cards to a ridiculous degree but how many cards does the company put on all year? You ain't going to compete with businesses putting on more shows than you unless you charge a lot more. You can make a healthier profit or income per event with a smaller business if you're putting on less shows(actually since less events means more demand maybe that's even more likely, look at live baseball attendance for example, crickets don't use cash).

Team sports also got a shit ton more ways to make money. They have more established more lucrative TV deals, they have numbered jerseys while the UFC is a skins sport(you can't wear someone's skin as a jersey or their face as a hat, that sounds trivial but that fact makes a HUGE difference, team sports have so many different ways to make money than the UFC or an individual sport does). What are you going to sell at a UFC store? Generic stuff with UFC on it? Like I know they prolly get creative(and the Reebok deal was part of that) but they can't work around the fact you can't market apparel in a sport where people are wearing basically none(at least not the way other sports do).
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I agree that in the United States those sports aren't regional -- I just meant that I think soccer is the only game that's popular everywhere in the world (and even then I'm not sure if its popular in India, which has 15% of the world's population in one country). Its kind of interesting that there isn't even one sport which is a top ranked sport (say top three) in every major country (say more than 20 million population) in the world.

I also agree the UFC isn't fair to its stars, but I suspect its revenue is still a lot less than the NHL's official revenue of $4.86 billion (American dollars) -- the UFC is not publicly traded so I couldn't find their revenue, but estimates are in the $700 million range, about 15% of NHL revenues. In fact I'd argue there's a reason they don't have as many events as the NHL has games -- they simply lack the fan base to support it. If the UFC thought they could profitably run 1200 events a year (that's how many games the NHL has every year) they'd jump at it.

You're right that team sports have far more ways to make money than individual sports (with the exception of golf which seems to generate outside income as well as the team sports selling by golf equipment to recreational players, and green fees, club fees etc). There's also a kind of bandwagon effect for sports teams that individual sports don't have, local enthusiasm etc; but that's all part of the popularity of the sport.

One problem MMA will always have (and boxing too) is that not many people want their kids playing it, or want to play it themselves when they get older. Every other sport builds its fan base on people who grew up playing the sport, and that's always going to be a huge advantage. I don't think either MMA or boxing will be more than niche (say 10% viewership) because of that.

Moreover, I'd suggest that the number of people participating in a sport should be considered as part of its popularity (though I suppose that would make running one of the most popular sports given the number of joggers -- and possibly swimming too). It takes a bigger commitment to a sport to do it than to just watch it. Someone who plays hockey but doesn't watch the NHL is a bigger hockey fan in my books than someone who watches the NHL but doesn't play it themselves.
 
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If you ask 100 random people who the UFC heavyweight champion is 50 of them will say Mike Tyson 30 will say Chuck Norris 19 will say Donald Trump and 1 MIGHT be semi close and say Brock Lesnar
 
San Griente said:
This is slightly off-topic, but UFC has failed to create celebrities. By celebrity, I mean someone non-fans have heard of. The average person has never heard of Jon Jones, but can rattle off Tyson, Hearns, Hagler, Bowe, etc.

Why is that?
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You seriously think the average person knows who hagler hearns or bowe is?
 
Golf is not a sport. If you try to say it is you are a fool and Chad.
 
AnotherOldGuy said:
But there are more Americans who can't name one MMA fighter. Right now more Americans are following the Women's World Cup than have ever watched an MMA fight. I was surprised myself, but the networks make their ratings public.

Mia Hamm and Hope Solo both have huge name recognition in America (particularly among young women) compared to MMA fighters.
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But they only watch women's soccer for 3 weeks every 4 years. And a handful of events around the country.

Same with Olympics. Horse racing is one hour, 3x every spring/summer (Derby, Downs and Preakness).

All of those examples strengthen my earlier point that depending on how you define the minutia of the question changes the answer. And IMO, watching womens world cup every 4 years makes women's soccer less popular than MMA, even if everyone has heard of Hope Solo. But that's just me :)
 
mallen7272 said:
This is what it looked like in 2012
sports-marketing-graph.jpg
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lol wtf I have a hard time believing that many people watch fucking figure skating. Do they masturbate to it or what is it?
 
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