UFC 205 was absolutely stacked. Though it was hurt by the last minute losses of a Donald Cerrone vs. Kelvin Gastelum welterweight bout and a Tim Kennedy vs. Rashad Evans middleweight bout, it still stood out as the most talent-rich card in UFC history.
The lineup was topped by a lightweight title fight between divisional champ Eddie Alvarez and featherweight king Conor McGregor. Below this title fight were two others: a welterweight title fight between Tyron Woodley and Stephen “Wonderboy” Thompson, and a strawweight title fight between Joanna Jedrzejczyk and Karolina Kowalkiewicz. The rest of the card, finally, was packed with big names like Yoel Romero, Chris Weidman, Miesha Tate, Raquel Pennington, Frankie Edgar, Jeremy Stephens, Khabib Nurmagomedov and Michael Johnson.
Given the stacked nature of this card, it’s not exactly surprising, but it apparently blew all previous UFC cards out of the water in terms of pay-per-view sales, viewership and live gate.
UFC President Dana White announced the card’s status as a record-breaker at the UFC 205 post-fight press conference.
“Sitting here tonight we broke every record in UFC history tonight,” White told the media at the presser. “Every record. The only one I’m waiting on now is the FOX number, how did FOX Sports 1 do. It would be really, really weird and make no sense if we didn’t break that one too.”
When asked to confirm that UFC 205 was indeed the company’s highest selling pay-per-view, White answered emphatically.
“We broke the record,” he said.
White also touched on the card’s massive live gate, which broke all previous records for the venue, Madison Square Garden.
“We definitely priced fans out,” he explained. “I mean there’s no doubt that that did happen. It’s not one of my favorite things to do, but basically it’s no different than…it’s dynamic pricing. It’s no different than a plane ticket. When there’s so much demand a plane ticket goes up. That’s what happened.”
“I mean, the place was sold out,” he explained. “It was packed to the rafters. We broke the Madison Square Garden record, which I don’t think will ever be broken again. Jesus is going to have to fight the Devil to break that record man. I just don’t see what does it.”
Are you surprised by UFC 205’s status as a record-breaker? Sound off, PENN Nation!