WWE’s TV rights negotiations could have major implications for AEW’s future.
With 2024 right around the corner, one of the major stories heading into the new year will be the negotiations over the TV rights for WWE’s Monday Night RAW. Friday Night SmackDown is set to return to USA Network next year, whilst NXT is heading to the CW Network, however RAW’s future remains up in the air, with several major streaming names having been in the conversation over the past few months.
Dave Meltzer of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter is now reporting that the recent return of CM Punk and the subsequent success the company have had with his merchandise sales have been a major part of WWE’s pitch to Warner Bros. Discovery, the current home of AEW.
“One report we had was that Punk was a major part of the pitch, with the idea he’d be a regular on the Raw brand. The report we had included pushing his merchandise sales and social media views along with ratings of recent shows. Obviously the situation is back wide open and this greatly affects AEW, which has also been in talks with WBD on a number of deals besides just television rights renewals, including potential streaming. WBD also gets a cut of AEW’s streaming PPV buys through Bleacher Report.”
-WON
At the time of writing, it’s unclear as to who the frontrunners are for RAW’s TV rights, with streaming titans such as Disney, Netflix, and Amazon having previously been touted as potential landing spots.
Interestingly, it was also noted by Meltzer that the people negotiating RAW’s TV rights are the same people that negotiated fellow TKO promotion UFC’s new contract with ESPN.
“UFC’s contract with ESPN was negotiated by the same people doing the key negotiations for Raw right now.”
-WON
As always, we’ll aim to provide any further updates on WWE’s TV rights negotiations, as well as what the potential implications could be for AEW should WBD’s interest lead to a deal, as soon as we hear more.
