Dominick Cruz to Defend Title on Free TV: Is the UFC Disrespecting the Champ?

It was recently announced that the next challenger for Dominick Cruz' UFC bantamweight championship would be Demetrious Johnson.

The bout is set to take place at UFC on Versus 6.

This marks the first time that a UFC title fight has taken place on free TV since Quinton Jackson defended his light-heavyweight belt against Dan Henderson at UFC 75, and it's the first time a UFC championship has not been defended at a major event.

Is the UFC disrespecting Dominick Cruz by having him defend his title at one of the promotion's smaller events, something they have not asked any other champion to do?

Technically, yes, they are. However, I don't believe that is the company's intent.

When looking at this dilemma, it's important to note that Dominick Cruz is relatively new to the UFC, as is the entire bantamweight division.

As a result, the fans are not well acquainted with the 135-pound weight class.

Therein lies the problem.

The UFC is a business, and as such it is in their best interest to have the most marketable fights headlining their pay-per-views in order to maximize their profits.

Given that most casual fans are still unfamiliar with Cruz, he does not make a good main-event fighter for the UFC.

Some of you may be thinking, "Didn't Dominick already main event a pay-pay-view? And it didn't it go reasonably well?".

Yes, Dominick did headline UFC 132 and, yes, it went well. The situation is more complicated than that, however.

UFC 132 was an absolutely stacked card and, with the right main event, could have been one of the biggest events of the year.

Instead, the card pulled in an average amount of buys, coming in under 400,000.

Another thing to consider is that, at UFC 132, Cruz was defending his title against Urijah Faber, who is arguably the most well-known MMA fighter under 155 pounds.

It's likely that more people purchased that card because they knew who Faber was than because they knew who Cruz was.

In his upcoming title fight, Dominick does not have the advantage of having such a marketable opponent.

Demetrious Johnson is almost completely unknown to the casual fan base and doesn't have a particularly exciting style.

Considering that Cruz brought in an average amount of buys when headlining a stacked card, with the most marketable opponent possible (inside his own weight class), would it be a good idea to have Dominick main event another card with an opponent most people will not have heard of?

Absolutely not.

By putting Cruz on a free-to-watch card, the UFC is dodging a potentially financially-disappointing main event and, given that tons of people tune into free events, effectively introducing Dominick to more fans so that he may become a more marketable headliner in the future.

All the while, they'll be making the Versus network very happy by pulling in huge ratings; there's no doubt that a UFC championship being defended on free TV will draw a lot of attention.

Cruz probably isn't too happy about having to defend his title at a less-prestigious event than all of the other UFC champions, but it is exactly the right business move for the UFC and, as a business, it's the best decision they could have made.

It's not personal.