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Why UFC Vows Never to Return to Vegas Sphere

UFC 306, scheduled for Saturday, Sept. 14, will not only be the first sports event held at the Las Vegas Sphere. It will probably the last, if a lesson is to be learned from UFC CEO Dana White’s admitted mistake.

With production costs mounting and ticket prices in freefall, UFC 306 (aka Riyadh Season Noche) will be the first, and probably last, sports event to be held at the Las Vegas Sphere. (Image: UFC)

Tickets for UFC 306 sported the highest face value of any event ever staged in Las Vegas. They started at $2,500 for seats in the rafters and topped off at $23,437.50 for floor seats to the right of the Octagon.

As of Wednesday evening, only a few hundred of those face-value seats remained on Ticketmaster out of an original allotment of 18,500.

However, this does not mean that the event is nearly sold out. Thousands of tickets are still floating around reseller sites, where their prices have plummeted. StubHub has them starting at $720, Vivid at $502 and Seat Geek at $531.

On Ticketmaster, verified resellers (scalpers, basically) are losing their shirts on full public display. Right behind two of the original $23K seats (FLR3, Row 3, Seats 3-4) are five reseller seats on offer for $5,500 each (FLR3, Row 5, Seats 5-12).

The dots represent all the tickets for UFC 306 still available on Ticketmaster three days before the event. The blue ones are seats that never sold, the pink ones are on offer from verified resellers. These do not represent the only available tickets, however, as thousands are listed only on other reseller sites. (Image: Ticketmaster)

If these seats are still available hours before the event, their prices must be lowered much further if they are to sell at all. That includes the hundreds still listed at face value on Ticketmaster — unless UFC gives them away to VIPs, which is likely.

Why So Much?

Branded as Riyadh Season Noche UFC, for Mexican Independence Day two days later, the 10-bout spectacle promises an excellent lineup headlined by bantamweight champion Sean O’Malley defending his title against No. 1 contender Merab Dvalishvili.

But not $2,500-$23K-a-ticket excellent.

According to Billboard magazine, Dana White felt forced to charge that much to pay for its $8 million production costs — specifically, producing video content for the Sphere’s massive hi-def screen.

“Think about U2,” White told SNY Sports on Sept. 10, referring to the Irish rock band’s Sphere residency last year. “Whatever that cost them, they had 40 nights to amortize those costs. We just have one.”

Now, however, Billboard claims that White’s production costs have ballooned to $20 million — even after UFC partnered with outside producers, including Valerie Bush and Antigravity Academy, who will screen their own 90-second videos between bouts.

Of course, UFC will recoup some of its financial losses via pay-per-view sales, but, as White told MMA reporter John Morgan recently, “We’re not ever doing an event at the Sphere again,”

White Lies

Last October, White told ESPN’s Pat McAfee that “I have become obsessed with the Sphere,” adding that he had his entire production crew check out U2’s residency to conceive of ideas for visuals to envelop the Octagon.

“I’m telling you right now, this place is incredible,” White said.

If the new Billboard story is to be believed, however, White was not being entirely truthful.

According to the trade publication, White never wanted to stage UFC 306 at the Sphere. The Vegas orb only became an option after executives with MGM Resorts signed a deal with boxing promoter Al Hyman to bring Canelo Álvarez v. Edgar Berlanga to the T-Mobile Arena on Sept. 14 — a date White claims that UFC was promised in a 2017 anchor tenant agreement with T-Mobile.

That’s the arena that hosted last year’s “Noche UFC,” whose tickets were priced starting at $120 each.

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Las Vegas Never Forgot Tina Turner

Though Tina Turner retired from the concert stage in 2008, the R&B superstar — who died Wednesday at age 83 — was not forgotten by the town whose history intersected for decades with her own. “Tina — The Tina Turner Musical” had already been set to play Las Vegas June 6-11 at the Smith Center.

Tina Turner performs on Dec. 30, 1999 at the Thomas & Mack Center in Las Vegas. (Image: tinaturnerblog.com)

“With her music and her boundless passion for life, she enchanted millions of fans around the world and inspired the stars of tomorrow,” an update posted by Turner’s official Facebook site read. “Today, we say goodbye to a dear friend who leaves us all her greatest work: her music.”

Tina and Ike Turner perform at the Las Vegas Hilton on Dec. 21, 1973. (Image: Las Vegas News Bureau)

Simply the Best

Turner — born Anna Mae Bullock in a segregated Tennessee hospital — made a career of overcoming obstacles. In addition to poverty and racism, she also survived the physical abuse and financial ruination heaped on her by Ike Turner, her 20-year musical and romantic partner, with whom she had hits with the signature songs “Proud Mary” and “River Deep, Mountain High.”

In August 1969, Ike & Tina Turner headlined the International Hotel — not in the main theater but in the 500-seat Casino Theatre. It was during this stint that Ike began using cocaine, according to a profile in Ebony magazine published following his death from a cocaine overdose on Dec. 12, 2007.

The duo also performed at Caesars Palace in May 1971, as the opening act for Johnny Mathis, and at the Las Vegas Hilton in their own residency from Dec. 13-26, 1973.

Let’s (Not) Stay Together

When Turner finally found the courage to break out of the orbit of the man who discovered her, she returned to Caesars Palace to launch a solo career from July 21 to August 2, 1977. In her 40s — an age when most female singers are relegated to the oldies concert circuit — she finally became a superstar. Her hit “What’s Love Got to Do With It” was the best-selling single of 1984, selling more than 2 million copies worldwide.

Turner shared the bill with Elton John as part of two “Millennium Concert” performances they gave Dec. 30-31, 1999 at the Thomas & Mack Center. And Turner performed three concerts at the MGM Grand Garden Arena in 2000.

It was also on the Caesars stage — during a May 2008 “Oprah Winfrey Show” taping with Cher — that Turner announced her retirement at age 68. Her 50th anniversary tour spanned 84 concerts in North America and Europe from October 2008 though May 2009.

Turner sold more than 150 million records during her career, won 12 Grammys, and was voted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame twice –with Ike in 1991, and on her own 30 years later. She was also honored by the Kennedy Center in 2005.

Turner died at her home in Switzerland, where she became a citizen a decade ago. According to her spokesperson, the cause of death was “a long illness” that was not identified.

Turner was predeceased by her sons, Ronnie Turner, who died in 2022 at age 62, and Craig Turner, who died in 2018 by suicide.

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