UFC 102 Not A Hot Ticket In Portland

Portland, Oregon has long been considered a hotbed of mixed martial arts. The area is home to numerous MMA gyms, the most famous being Gresham's Team Quest. Regional MMA promotions like Matt Lindland's SportFight and amateur MMA draws good crowds, and there's few markets in the country that have such a strong mainstream acceptance and understanding of mixed martial arts.

The UFC originally planned to hold an event in Portland last year, but when Randy Couture resigned with the promotion and agreed to fight Brock Lesnar UFC 91 was moved to Las Vegas MGM Grand Garden Arena. The UFC rescheduled their Rose City debut for August 29th, headlined by a matchup between local hero Couture and tough PRIDE vet Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira.

What they received instead was an outpouring of apathy from the community. As of early this week, there had been as few as 8,500 tickets sold in the 21,000 seat Rose Garden Arena. Even media sources like Yahoo Sports, who invariably put a positive spin on everything the UFC, does are reporting just over 10,000 tickets sold.

Earlier in the week Zuffa announced the postponement of a WEC event scheduled for Youngstown, Ohio. The official reason given was an injury to main event fighter Ben Henderson, and while thats not been confirmed several sources have indicated that he did suffer a minor setback during training. More curiously, the WEC announced that the show would no longer be held in Youngstown despite what they insisted were strong ticket sales.

While Youngstown could have been a bad choice for a MMA event all along, the UFC will probably blame the economy for the poor showing of live ticket sales in Portland. While the high unemployment rate nationally and regionally doesnt help things, it doesnt appear to be a major factor in the UFCs struggles to sell tickets in the Rose City. A number of local media outlets including the Portland based MMA website THE SAVAGE SCIENCE have talked to area UFC fans, and the results are surprising. A mind boggling number of people who self identify as casual or serious fans of the UFC had no idea that an event was being held in Portland at all. Thats likely due to a marketing and promotion campaign locally that is somewhere between misplaced and non-existent. The local media hasnt helped either, with Portlands largest newspaper providing little print coverage of UFC 102 claiming that its not a major sport.

Even among fans who *did* know that UFC 102 was coming to Portland, theres no buzz whatsoever. Theres a variety of reasons for this"many fans have suggested that the high ticket prices werent justified by a relatively weak card. With the exception of the main event, there arent any fighters on the UFC 102 card that are exactly household names outside of hardcore MMA circles.

The UFC has a misguided notion that they can simply put their name on an arena marquee and local fans will pay top dollar for tickets regardless of who is fighting on the card or what else is going on that night. The reality has demonstrated otherwise with poor ticket sales in Portland and other markets. While the promotions PPV business is doing fine and is their real source of revenue, the weakness of the demand for their live product outside of a select number of markets like Las Vegas and Montreal should be a source of concern.


Ross Everett is a widely published widely published freelance sports writer and highly respected authority on World Cup soccer betting. His writing has appeared on a variety of sports sites including sports news and betting odds sites. He lives in Las Vegas with three Jack Russell Terriers and a kangaroo. He is currently working on an autobiography of former energy secretary Donald Hodell.