Spike Calls on Ratings Heavy-Hitter Kimbo Slice for TUF Live Counter-Programming

Spike TV continues its counter-programming war against the UFC and Fox. The network’s latest salvo is The Ultimate Fighter Fridays.

The UFC on Fox launch The Ultimate Fighter: Live on March 9 on FX, so Spike is countering TUF Live with TUF taped. While the UFC is offering its new jive-live format that features footage edited during the week and leading up to a live fight on its current episode, Spike offers footage from its fourteen seasons as host network for The Ultimate Fighter.

Spike TV has also brought in its top draw to kick off its weekly counter-programming efforts.

Kimbo Slice (real name Kevin Ferguson) will host the March 9 kickoff of The Ultimate Fighter Fridays to “discuss never-before-revealed details of his experiences on the show and provide insight into what went on when the cameras weren’t rolling during the filming of the The Ultimate Fighter: Heavyweights.”

Season 10 of TUF, Kimbo’s season, was the highest rated of the series’ 14-season run on Spike. Season 14 delivered an average of 3.4 million viewers per week. The week that Kimbo fought eventual season winner Roy Nelson, the ratings hit 5.3 million viewers for that episode.

Now Spike hopes to rekindle the YouTube phenomenon, countering the UFC as the MMA juggernaut continues to establish itself across the Fox family of networks, including Fox, FX, and Fuel TV.

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