Bellator 179 on Friday night scored 607,000 viewers on a tape delayed event from the UK on Spike TV. The event featured Rory McDonald’s debut in Bellator and he earned the win over Paul Daley via submission.

ShowBuzz Daily reports that it drew 0.24 in the A18-49 demo. The show aired Friday night starting at 9pm ET.

The event was slightly less than last month’s live event and better than the two previous events.

Payout Perspective:

This event could have done much better than 607,000 viewers but the ratings are on par with other Bellator live events. So the question is whether Spike TV would be willing to uproot its normal programming to air an event on a Friday afternoon instead of Friday evening. Obviously, it was not willing to do it. One would think that if they did show it live, they would be a need to replay it later that night for those that missed it. But, at a time when everything is live, it’s somewhat odd to have an event on via tape delay (unless of course it’s the Masters).