UFC 306, scheduled for Saturday, September 14, would be the first sports activities occasion held on the Las Vegas Sphere. It is also the final if a lesson is to be realized from UFC CEO Dana White’s admitted mistake.
With manufacturing prices mounting and ticket costs in freefall, UFC 306 (aka Riyadh Season Noche) would be the first, and presumably final, sports activities occasion to be held on the Las Vegas Sphere. (Picture: UFC)
Tickets for UFC 306 sported the very best face worth of any occasion ever staged in Las Vegas. They began at $2,500 for seats within the rafters and topped off at $23,437.50 for flooring seats to the precise of the Octagon.
As of Wednesday night, only some hundred of these face-value seats remained on Ticketmaster out of an authentic allotment of 18,500.
This doesn’t imply that the occasion is almost bought out, nonetheless. 1000’s of tickets are nonetheless floating round reseller websites, the place their costs have plummeted. StubHub has them beginning at $720, Vivid at $502, and Seat Geek at $531.
On Ticketmaster, verified resellers (scalpers, mainly) are dropping their shirts on full public show. Proper behind two of the unique $23K seats (FLR3, Row 3, Seats 3-4) are 5 reseller seats on provide for $5,500 every (FLR3, Row 5, Seats 5-12).
The dots symbolize all of the tickets for UFC 306 nonetheless accessible on Ticketmaster three days earlier than the occasion. The blue ones are seats that by no means bought, the pink ones are on provide from verified resellers. These don’t symbolize the one accessible tickets, nonetheless, as 1000’s are listed solely on different reseller websites. (Picture: Ticketmaster)
If these seats are nonetheless accessible hours earlier than the occasion, their costs should be lowered a lot additional if they’re to promote in any respect. That features the a whole bunch nonetheless listed at face worth on Ticketmaster until UFC provides them away to VIPs, which is probably going.
Why So A lot?
Branded as Riyadh Season Noche UFC, for Mexican Independence Day two days later, the 10-bout spectacle guarantees a wonderful lineup headlined by bantamweight champion Sean O’Malley defending his title in opposition to No. 1 contender Merab Dvalishvili.
However not $2,500-$23K-a-ticket wonderful.
In response to Billboard magazine, Dana White felt obligated to cost that a lot to pay for the present’s $8 million manufacturing prices — particularly, producing video content material for the Sphere’s large hi-def display screen.
Take into consideration U2,” White instructed SNY Sports activities on September 10, referring to the Irish rock band’s Sphere residency final yr. “No matter that value them, they’d 40 nights to amortize these prices. We simply have one.”
Now, nonetheless, Billboard claims that White’s manufacturing prices have ballooned to $20 million, even after UFC partnered with outdoors producers, together with Valerie Bush and Antigravity Academy, who will display screen their very own 90-second movies between bouts.
In fact, UFC will recoup a few of its monetary losses by way of pay-per-view gross sales, however, as White instructed MMA reporter John Morgan not too long ago, “We’re not ever doing an occasion on the Sphere once more.”
White Lies
Final October, White instructed ESPN’s Pat McAfee that “I’ve change into obsessive about the Sphere,” including that he had his total manufacturing crew take a look at U2’s residency to conceive of concepts for visuals to envelop the Octagon.
“I’m telling you proper now, this place is unimaginable,” White stated.
If the brand new Billboard story is to be believed, nonetheless, White wasn’t being completely truthful.
In response to the commerce publication, White by no means wished to stage UFC 306 on the Sphere. The Vegas orb solely grew to become an possibility after executives with MGM Resorts signed a cope with boxing promoter Al Hyman to carry Canelo Álvarez v. Edgar Berlanga to the T-Cell Area on September 14 — a date White claims that UFC was promised in a 2017 anchor tenant settlement with T-Cell.
That’s the world that hosted final yr’s “Noche UFC,” whose tickets had been priced beginning at $120 every.
