Alberto El Patron
Combate Americas announced ratings for its first two live, 2018 events –Combate Estrellas I and Combate Estrellas II – which also marked the historic, first-ever live Univision and Univision Deportes Network (UDN) televised Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) events, on Friday, April 13 and Friday, April 20, respectively.
Despite its start time of midnight ET in the United States, Combate Estrellas I delivered a total of 583,000 Persons 2+, including 296,000 Adults in the coveted 18-49 age group, on the Univision and Univision Deportes Network simulcast, beating Bellator 197, which aired in primetime on the Paramount Network.
In Mexico, the event delivered over 4 million live broadcast television viewers on Azteca 7.
The Facebook LIVE stream of the Combate Estrellas I preliminary bout card, which immediately preceded the 90-minute live television airing of the main card, delivered over 294,000 streams.
“The amazing growth of our TV ratings confirms we are the hottest MMA promotion in the world,” said Combate Americas CEO Campbell McLaren.
Airing exclusively on UDN in the midnight ET slot the following Friday, April 20, Combate Estrellas II delivered another 200,000 Total Viewers, a 10 percent increase from the first installment of the two-part, Combate Estrellas live event series. Last Friday’s live ratings for Combate Estrellas II on UDN (200K viewers) at 12am ET, beat those of the new episode of The Ultimate Fighter (185K viewers) that aired on FOX Sports 1 (FS1) in primetime two nights before Combate Estrellas II.
Like Combate Americas, advertisers also emerged victorious from the record-ratings.
“We were thrilled to partner with Anheuser-Busch’s Estrella Jalisco, Advanced Auto Parts, Double Cross Vodka, HOT 6 Energy Drink and Battle Boom Gaming for the event, which allowed them to engage with the consumer on location, as well as reaching millions of consumers through multi-platforms with respective key brand messaging. Combate Americas is the only MMA engine in existence today that serves 100 percent a Hispanic demographic, allowing brands to streamline and reach the fastest growing population in the world and a consumer set that will spend close to US$1.7 trillion in 2018,” said Combate Americas CRO, Mike Pine.
UDN outperforms ESPN, FOX Sports 1 and NBC Sports Network during Liga MX final in primetime
UDN out-delivered NBC Sports Network, MLB Network, and Fox Sports 1 last week
