The preliminary television ratings for Bellator 149 came out earlier this afternoon and the event headlined by Royce Gracie and Ken Shamrock is now the most watched event in Bellator history.
The three hour fight card averaged 1.964 million viewers on Spike TV and the co-main event bout between Kevin “Kimbo Slice” Ferguson and Dhafir “Dada 5000” Harris averaged 2.5 million viewers (11:16-11:30). When it came to the main event, Gracie and Shamrock delivered 2.4 million viewers (11:54-11:57p).
Spike TV announced the ratings in a press release on Monday event and also revealed some other details about the ratings from Friday night.
Bellator ratings highlights on Spike include:
Bellator 149 was #1 ranked telecast of the day with Men 18-34 in all of television (broadcast and cable).Spike ranked #1 ranked in all of television with Men 18-34, Men 18-49, Men 25-34, and Men 35-49 in the timeslot (9:00-12:00)
Bellator 149 was #3 ranked telecast of the day in all of television with Adults 18-49.
Most watched MMA telecast on Spike in nearly 5 years (3/26/11)
The Spike/Bellator original special “Benson Henderson: Unrivaled” delivered 818,000 viewers at 12:00am ET/PT
Bellator 149 was a Digital/ Social Media hit as well:
Bellator 149 drew the most people tweeting and number of tweets in cable TV during primetime on Friday.
The Bellator 149 livestream drew 124% more views than the previous high (Bellator 138 Kimbo vs. Shamrock).
Bellator 149 trended on Twitter throughout the telecast.
With the viewership from Friday, the average viewership for Bellator since the beginning of 2014 in the preliminary ratings is now at 804k. The average for tentpole events during that timeframe is 1.2 million and non-tent pole events are averaging 649k. More information on the Bellator 149 ratings will be released on Wednesday when the +3 DVR numbers are released by Nielson.