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So the big ramp and the elaborate entrances were done away with, and the floor layout was reconfigured to fit in more seating. Zuffa said it was because the promotion was moving toward a more legitimate sport presentation, like that of boxing, but the real reason was to save some change.

At that time, someone at Zuffa told me the UFC was nearing $40 million in the hole and if it didn’t turn around, the Fertittas wouldn’t be able to put any more money into it.

UFC 48

“Payback”

June 19, 2004

Mandalay Bay Events Center

Las Vegas, Nevada

Bouts I Reffed:

Evan Tanner vs. Phil Baroni

Ken Shamrock vs. Kimo Leopoldo

Referee Herb Dean made a call referees worldwide could be proud of in the heavyweight championship bout between Mir and Sylvia. Mir snagged Sylvia in an armbar from his back and used his muay Thai cup as a fulcrum to break Sylvia’s bones. Dean saw the break and stopped the fight immediately, but because of the fighters’ positions and the camera angle, no one else in the arena caught it. Imagine an arena filled with 10,000 people booing you while the injured fighter walks around like he’s fine: a referee’s nightmare. When the crowd finally saw the break from a better angle on the big screens, they changed their minds quickly. It was a small victory for MMA referees everywhere.

The UFC was struggling, but it wouldn’t go down without a fight. Zuffa wasn’t afraid to make changes when things weren’t working, and I’m fairly sure this was one of the reasons it would survive this desperate time.

One change Zuffa made involved marketing the fighters and the UFC product as a whole. Zuffa had quickly realized it couldn’t control what happened with fighters. Lorenzo Fertitta had told me he wanted to build stars, and the promotion certainly had boosted a few, such as Tito Ortiz, Chuck Liddell, and Randy Couture, early on. However, from the undercard up to the main event, athletes withdrew all the time due to injury. Or even worse, Zuffa could spend a lot of time and money building up a particular fighter, and at a moment’s notice, he could end up leaving the promotion.

Zuffa could control the rest of the product, however. A strong brand would carry the product as the stars came and went. This way of marketing was something both SEG and Zuffa were criticized for in the beginning because it wasn’t the way it was done in boxing, where fighters were the emphasis. Most of the time, the fans couldn’t tell you what company was promoting a boxing event, but they could tell you who the headliner was. Yet emphasizing the UFC brand over one or two star fighters proved a wise business decision for Zuffa.

Don’t get me wrong. Zuffa treated the fighters well, certainly better than I’d seen other promotions do till that point. The fighters and at least one cornerman were flown into the host towns a few days early, put up in nice hotels, and given daily stipends for food. What could anyone ask for that the promotion wasn’t already providing?

Some fighters, like Randy Couture, had issues with Zuffa. He looked at things the way he looked at them. I know he always felt like Zuffa was trying to get rid of him, but I never looked at it that way. If there was one thing most of the fighters could complain about, it was the amount of money they were making, especially when others were getting much bigger paydays from Pride in Japan.

But to be able to pay the fighters more, the UFC needed to begin turning a profit. Unfortunately, the product wasn’t clicking with the consumers. There was too much of a negative stigma, and the UFC wasn’t reaching far outside the core fan base that had been there when Zuffa had purchased the promotion in 2001. There had to be a way to get the message to a large audience faster.

I was hopeful when Dana White told me Zuffa was working on landing a reality show on one of the TV networks. He wasn’t thrilled about it; he’d dreamed that, like boxing, the UFC would get its own live weekly fight night show. White told me Fertitta was the one who