By James Caldwell, Torch assistant editor

Viacom, the parent company of MTV Networks, has bought a majority stake in the Bellator MMA promotion and will begin airing fights on Spike TV in 2013, reports USA Today.

Spike will be looking to replace UFC programming, similar to Spike turning to TNA in 2005 when WWE returned to USA Network. Although TNA's ratings have not reached the numbers WWE Raw drew on Spike, Spike executives say they are hopeful Bellator's audience can grow over time.

"I had the same fear: 'Are people going to watch another wrestling organization on Spike?' " Spike president Kevin Kay said about transitioning from WWE to TNA. "That first year or so, we had probably (an average of) 600,000 viewers. Last week we had 2 million; it's the highest-rated TNA in the history of Spike."

Kay's comment to show Bellator's potential upward trajectory includes some misleading information considering Impact started as a one-hour show in an undesirable Saturday night timeslot before advancing to the more desirable Thursday night prime timeslot. Also, this past Thursday's Impact was tied for the most-watched episode of the year (not of all-time) and the second-highest-rated of the year (behind March 3).

The USA Today story also includes notes on Spike not having a timeslot yet for Bellator when the promotion moves from MTV2 to Spike in 2013. Kay also talked about Viacom/Spike wanting to have a stake in a promotion they were partnering with rather than "constantly negotiating," referring to UFC.

"As we realized that our relationship with UFC was likely to come to an end, our Viacom mergers and acquisitions folks, and us, started to have conversations with MTV2 about getting invested in a mixed martial arts promotion and become owners as opposed to renters," Kay said. "You're building value in something that you own, and you own it for the long term. You're not in a constant state of negotiation."

Link: Full story at USAToday.com.

Read more on this story and other MMA stories on our sister site, MMATorch.com.

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