On Sunday night, WWE held its first-ever live event at the UFC APEX with NXT Battleground, and fight fans were shocked at the professional wrestling spectacle that happened at a venue usually reserved for MMA, The Ultimate Fighter, or Power Slap.
It only took one look at the sizable crowd in attendance for just about everybody watching to wonder why the UFC doesn’t invite the same kind of live audience for the multitude of fight cards held in the same arena?
“You look holding a wrestling match at the APEX that they did the other night, and I saw a couple of videos and I was shocked as well,” UFC analyst Alan Jouban said on The Fighter vs. The Writer. “I’m somebody that’s at the APEX every weekend. I was like, ‘This is APEX?’ I didn’t even realize it. It looked like one of those NXT production studios they have in Florida.”
When UFC first started holding events at the APEX, it was during the height of the global COVID pandemic in 2020, and the self-contained arena allowed the promotion to control every possible aspect of production. Once the pandemic ended, UFC still saw a financial benefit to the APEX cards, especially with a broadcast deal in place with ESPN dependent on delivering a certain number of events per year.
In recent months, UFC CEO Dana White and executives at parent company TKO Group Holdings have both remarked that the organization wants to put more events out on the road and reduce the total number of cards held at the APEX. Just this past weekend in Louisville, Ky., a UFC event drew a $ 2.5 million gate to set a new record for a Fight Night event (breaking the record set in St. Louis just one month ago).
That being said, UFC APEX shows likely aren’t going away, but Jouban believes what WWE managed to pull off with the production of its NXT event might be the perfect catalyst to force some changes for future UFC cards in the same space.
“Look, the UFC is not one to be done up,” Jouban said. “Our producer Zach Candito, the best in the business, everybody says that. You will never find another producer as good as Zach. Dana White does not like to be done up. He always wants his production to be top notch.
“If NXT comes in with their first show or whatever show this was and they put on a spectacular show, and they also show, ‘Look we can get more bleachers, more seats in here, more screens, make it more lively. Make it that intimate feeling that they kind of have right now but with more people and energy.’ I really, really think it’s going to turn some heads at the UFC. They’re going to say, ‘We just got one-upped. Now we can bring something more.’”
From the @ufc to @WWE : Witness the time-lapse of the Apex being transformed for @WWENXT Battleground this past weekend! ️ pic.twitter.com/OmYoivQbbe
— TKO (@TKOGrp) June 11, 2024
Right now, UFC sells VIP experiences for fans interested in attending cards at the APEX, with the cost typically running in the thousands for a single ticket. Some of the more expensive packages are in the five-figure range.
That pricing structure would likely change if UFC started filling the APEX with a bigger live crowd like the one that witnessed the NXT card. It’s undeniable that the energy and excitement for the pro wrestling show dwarfed what usually unfolds at a typical Fight Night on a Saturday in Las Vegas.
As much as UFC and WWE now exist as part of the same overall company, White still operates his business independently from what’s happening in the pro wrestling world.
Call it ego or call it true competitive nature, but Jouban just doesn’t see White applauding WWE on a job well done without thinking that he needs to up the ante where UFC is concerned.
“[White is] seeing the capabilities that other people are doing,” Jouban said. “A whole new production team so it’s different ideas. Dana is already kind of going outside the box with [Power] Slap. Because if you go to a Slap event, it’s done well. They have like 52 camera angles. It is ridiculous and there’s a lot of people there.
“I think we’re going to see this in the future. I think we’re going to start seeing what they just saw this past weekend with NXT. OK, there’s more capabilities, we can put more butts in the seats and maybe more screens and more lights and everything, and using a little bit of the stuff that they’re doing with slap fighting, and kind of merging them together and making these APEX shows, which are, A) cost effective, and B) they let all the fighters fight more frequently. Everybody wins from it. The only downfall was, ‘We miss the big crowd.’ Now that we know we can put 500, 1,000 more people in there and making it bigger and badder.”
In other words, WWE’s success at the APEX might be exactly what UFC needs to make some necessary changes to those events moving forward.
“I think it’s a great thing that could happen at the APEX,” Jouban said. “I think they just have to keep stepping it up and I think this is going to give them a good push in the right direction.”
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