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UFC Primetime had a very successful debut pulling in 880,000 viewers then another 614,000 with the replay. That's a total of 1,494,000 viewers for an hour's worth of television. To put this into perspective, the UFC 92 Countdown show drew 733,000 viewers for its one hour premiere and was the highest rated PPV Preview of 2008. Primetime managed to double the ratings, and the second half hour was a replay. I'll say it again...Primetime doubled the ratings of the Countdown show for the arguably the best UFC PPV card ever...with a replay on the back end. Amazing.

I didn't think the show was anything spectacular. It was what I expected it to be. BJ running around Hawaii and being dramatic. Georges wearing goofy outfits and going to discotheques. Hopefully they continue to feature the training as much as they did last night. My main beef with The Ultimate Fighter is their reluctance to give us more than 1 minute training segments. I don't care about fighters getting drunk and acting tough in the house. I want to see how they prepare for the fights. Primetime flipped the TUF formula around and gave us just the right amount of personal life with equal parts training footage.

And of course, the best thing to come out of the premiere episode was BJ Penn's boyhood afro/mustache combo.


UFC Primetime Draws 1.4 Mil [Rear Naked News]