When UFC president Dana White was asked after UFC 150 this past weekend about a date for the UFC Lightweight Championship bout between champion Benson Henderson and top contender Nate Diaz, White's most significant response was that he and UFC co-owner Lorenzo Fertitta had come up with some "pretty cool ideas."
Now that those ideas have come to fruition, the MMA community can agree that they're pretty cool.
Henderson and Diaz will meet on December 8 in the main event of a UFC on Fox 5 fight card that will also feature ex-light heavyweight champ Mauricio "Shogun" Rua against up-and-coming light heavyweight star Alexander Gustafsson and former two-division titleholder BJ Penn taking on fast rising welterweight contender Rory MacDonald. A fourth fight, yet to be announced, will complete the main card.
The UFC has struggled to hit the right notes with its network broadcast offerings on Fox so far in 2012, the first year of a seven-year deal with Fox Sports that also includes The Ultimate Fighter on FX, news and archive content on Fuel TV, and live fight cards and preliminary fights on both cable networks. The first fight card of the contract (in Chicago in January) failed to deliver the action fans wanted, and the subsequent cards, while more exciting, haven't moved the needle in the ratings (although running the August 4 fight card opposite NBC's broadcast of the Olympics probably didn't help).
For the December fight card, however, the UFC is going all-out. In Henderson and Diaz, the main event features two fighters known for delivering exciting action in the Octagon, battling it out for the championship of the world at 155 pounds. Supporting that main event are two former UFC Champions in Shogun and Penn, matched up against two stars of the future in Gustafsson and MacDonald. With those fights, the UFC on FOX 5 fight card compares favorably against the main card of a number of recent pay-per-views.
When the UFC and Fox looked to jumpstart their contract with a special fight last year, they went for a title bout, with Junior dos Santos challenging Cain Velasquez for the UFC Heavyweight Championship. In terms of attracting eyeballs, the strategy worked, but the brief duration of the fight worked against the UFC and Fox. With Diaz and Henderson, they're trying again, and backing it up with other names that will attract eyeballs.
It may work, it may not. But White was right. It is a "pretty cool idea."
