Nakisa Bidarian thinks what his promotion achieved on Netflix last Saturday could not be replicated by their rivals.
The Most Valuable Promotions co-founder enjoyed a successful night in California alongside Jake Paul, as their organization entered the MMA realm for the first time.
Fans inside Intuit Dome witnessed Ronda Rousey submitting Gina Carano in 17 seconds, Mike Perry’s beatdown of Nate Diaz, and another devastating knockout from Francis Ngannou to defeat Philipe Lins.
As well as those inside the arena, 17 million tuned in on Netflix, a figure that Bidarian does not believe the UFC’s upcoming White House event could attain.
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What did you make of the very first MVP MMA event on Netflix? 🤔
Nakisa Bidarian doubts UFC could match MVP MMA’s Netflix numbers with the White House card
Much of the build-up to the first MMA event on Netflix centered around the UFC, with many MVP stars firing shots at the sport’s leading promotion.
Comparisons arose between the May 16 card and the upcoming UFC White House event, which will take place on June 14 and features title fights for Ilia Topuria and Alex Pereira.
Rousey said the White House card “sucks,” but many in the community have laughed off claims the MVP lineup was superior to what UFC fans have awaiting them in June.
Those same people have downplayed the Netflix viewing figures for Rousey vs Carano, insisting that breaking the record for the most watched MMA event in history was always going to happen on the streaming platform.
Nakisa Bidarian, however, does not believe the UFC could have achieved the same figure if the White House event was being streamed on Netflix instead of Paramount+.
“The question is: if you put the (UFC) White House card on Netflix, does it do as well as what we did on Saturday night? I don’t believe it does,” the MVP co-founder said on The Ariel Helwani Show.
“I think the magic of it was with the names that we had. The partnership of MVP and Netflix, that is what made it so powerful.
“I think they (Netflix) are very happy with the outcome,” he added.
That claim is already receiving plenty of pushback, given how much attention a partnership between Netflix and the UFC would no doubt receive.
A number of MMA fans on social media have quickly rejected Bidarian’s comments.
“This guy really is nuts. Not one of these fights was competitive.”
“If the White House card was on Netflix, it would double the amount of viewers that MVP peaked with.”
“Now he’s talking crazy. He was doing good until this delusional statement.”
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