If Elton John thinks Saturday night’s alright for fighting, then wait until he gets a load of Sunday’s action. UFC Fight Night 88 heads to the Mandalay Bay Events Center in Las Vegas on Sunday for an action-packed evening.
As B/R's own Scott Harris put it: this card is dense. From top to bottom, it is filled with exciting and meaningful fights. It’s a can’t-miss event for fight fans.
But there is something strange with how the fight card is set up, and it has to do with the 135-pound division.
Headlining the event will be UFC’s No. 7-ranked undefeated phenom Thomas Almeida against the undefeated, but unranked, Cody Garbrandt. The stylistic matchup is sure to create fireworks, and in isolation, this seems like a fun main event. But down the card, in just the second fight of the evening, is No. 4-ranked Aljamain Sterling vs. the No. 8-ranked Bryan Caraway.
That’s weird. Why is Top 10-level bout with a possible title contender buried beneath two prospects?
It’s a curious decision. The biggest reason for Sterling vs. Caraway to be placed on UFC Fight Pass as its featured prelim is for the UFC to boost its streaming service with a top-notch contest. And they are getting behind the fight more than any other on the card from a production standpoint.
Almeida and Garbrandt do not have a longstanding rivalry, and neither is an exceptionally skilled trash-talker. It’s just an appealing fight based on their skills alone. There’s nothing wrong with that, but for the main event, it lacks the juice Sterling and Caraway bring.
Sterling has been calling out Caraway for a year, and he has referred to him as “Mr. Tate," per Bloody Elbow, alluding to his world champion counterpart Miesha Tate. There’s a little heat between the two. It would play better to the television audience in promotional material.
The UFC recently released a short hype video with Sterling. But if the company was serious about highlighting Sterling as a future star of this division, would it not use its production and promotional muscles behind him in the main event on Fox Sports 1?
Undoubtedly, putting fights such as Sterling vs. Caraway on Fight Pass will draw fans to the service, but they would still be for the hardcore combat sports fans. The way to reach casual followers is to put them on the larger platforms. Since the UFC is a private company, we do not have any indication as to how many subscribers the $9.99 service boasts, but it is likely still only serving the aforementioned niche audience.
Fight Night events typically average around a million viewers, per MMAPayout.com.
By being on Fight Pass, Sterling vs. Caraway makes the cost of the monthly service well worth the price, but so would Almeida vs. Garbrandt. Either the UFC sees more stardom in those two or it is missing the boat on promoting a charismatic star who could be leading the division before we know it.
As fight fans, we win. We will still get to see both tilts. Casual fans might not get that chance, and they may be missing the next title contender as he performs on the brand’s streaming service.
There are myriad possibilities for why Sterling vs. Caraway sits way down the billing while Almeida vs. Garbrandt headlines, but it still looks and feels weird. Very weird.
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