Bloody Elbow Radio, presented by Bad Boy, was live Thursday to discuss the latest in mixed martial arts. Hosts Matt Bishop, Forrest Lynn and MMA Mania's Brian Hemminger preview the main card of this weekend's UFC 131, which is headlined by a heavyweight bout between Junior dos Santos and Shane Carwin, a featherweight bout between Kenny Florian and Diego Nunes and a middleweight tilt between Mark Munoz and Demian Maia.
We also discussed the UFC's developing television situation and the pros/cons of a potential purchase of G4.
We were joined by Bellator CEO Bjorn Rebney for a very extensive and informative interview. We talked with him about his thoughts about the recently completed Season 4, what improvements he would make, the ratings patterns, running shows at casinos, his relationship with Spike TV, where the Summer Series concept came from, what tournaments are planned for Season 5 and Season 6, the status of the company's female division, the potential for flyweights and more.
He talked about whether or not it was frustrating to get the Season 4 ratings back on a weekly basis and see no pattern.
"It wasn't frustrating. The reality is MTV2 represents a completely new network for mixed martial arts. It represents a unique demographic, a younger demographic than what typically skews to our sport, so it was a matter of putting it out there, allowing people to find it, allowing fans to come to the network and allow the people who were watching the network already to get comfortable with and start to enjoy Bellator on MTV2. You go through these runs as you start out these new relationships on televisions and thankfully, as we got toward the end of the season, as everything started to coalesce and we got into the final few shows, the numbers were great and it was representative of where we want to be and the kind of results you want to see.
So I really didn't draw a lot out of it. When you're building out a brand like this, it's a marathon, not a sprint. You've got to be cognizant of that and you can't get too caught up in what's going on on a week-to-week basis. You have to look at it more from a 30,000 foot perspective. From a 30,000 foot perspective, I was really pleased with what went on and couldn't be happier with the folks at MTV Networks and MTV2."
Bloody Elbow Radio returns at midnight ET/9 p.m. PT immediately following the conclusion of UFC 131 to review the show.So I really didn't draw a lot out of it. When you're building out a brand like this, it's a marathon, not a sprint. You've got to be cognizant of that and you can't get too caught up in what's going on on a week-to-week basis. You have to look at it more from a 30,000 foot perspective. From a 30,000 foot perspective, I was really pleased with what went on and couldn't be happier with the folks at MTV Networks and MTV2."
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