UFC’s Lawrence Epstein said ESPN never pressured the company on how quickly fight cards could resume during the pandemic.getty images
One of the most common misconceptions in sports media is that because TV networks pay so much in rights fees, they have an oversized influence on how the leagues actually operate.
I have found the exact opposite to be true. Network executives generally are kept in the loop with developments — sometimes they even offer their opinions — but TV executives aren’t the ones pulling the strings.
Take the Big Ten, for example. ESPN and Fox Sports executives were surprised when word started leaking that the conference was postponing its football season. A month later, they were kept in the loop when the conference voted to start the season in October, but their influence on that decision was negligible.
I asked UFC COO Lawrence Epstein to describe how much pressure he felt from ESPN to resume its fight cards in May, when all other sports were shut down due to the pandemic. Epstein’s answer mirrors the way most league executives would handle this question.
“They never put any pressure on us,” Epstein said. “They never pushed us to do anything. They gave us, from day one, the flexibility to do what we wanted to do and on our timetable.”
Epstein addressed speculation that UFC moved so quickly to start back up because of TV money. After all, ESPN pays roughly $450 million per year for UFC’s linear, digital and pay-per-view rights through 2025.
“It’s not true — we didn’t do it for the money,” Epstein said. “ESPN didn’t push us to do it.”
Epstein went on to talk about how good UFC’s relationship is with ESPN, which doesn’t give the media company added influence, but does keep ESPN executives in the loop.
“It’s a combination of several factors,” Epstein said. “It starts with us getting back to putting on events quickly and also putting out high-quality events. … Then the third thing is, of course, the marketing machine that ESPN gives us with our linear channels, with their digital ecosystems, with the earned media that they generate around our events."
