May 12th was an unusually crowded night for combat sports. UFC 224 took place in Brazil, Bellator 199 went down in San Jose, and Vasyl Lomachenko vs. Jorge Linares was staged at Madison Square Garden. Lomachenko vs. Linares on ESPN went head-to-head with the UFC 224 prelims on FX, while the Bellator 199 main card on Paramount Network started an hour after the other two programs.
Lomachenko vs. Linares was the most important and meaningful combat sports event of the weekend, and unsurprisingly it had the most viewers and the best rating. The two-hour broadcast averaged 1,024,000 viewers and drew a 0.