8. Breaking Ground
UFC on Fox 1
Nov. 12, 2011 | Anaheim, Calif.
The UFC’s groundbreaking agreement with the Fox family of networks, signed in August 2011, was an unbelievably huge deal for a sport that had been effectively buried little more than a decade beforehand. It was the first of its kind and differed in substantial ways from the agreements promotions such as EliteXC and Strikeforce had run with CBS. This was to be a long-term, multi-platform relationship, with the UFC eventually serving as the anchor of the still-in-development Fox Sports 1 network that was intended to compete with ESPN.
The event was outstanding. Ricardo Lamas and Dustin Poirier put on awesome performances, and Benson Henderson took a decision from Clay Guida in a strong contender for “Fight of the Year” honors. When Velasquez and dos Santos walked out to the cage, the crowd was amped and ready for something epic, presumably a victory for the champion. That is not what happened. Velasquez opened slowly, eschewing his usual pressure game for a steady diet of jabs and low kicks, until dos Santos nailed him with a bomb of an overhand right a little over a minute into the fight. The crowd filed out, disappointed, and dos Santos left as the champion.
Even if the outcome was unexpected, however, that first outing on Fox represents one of the UFC’s high-water marks. The atmosphere was incredible, the ratings were off the charts (an average of 5.7 and a peak of 8.8 million viewers), and the fight itself offered a hint of what the UFC’s best were capable of accomplishing.
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