WWE’s contract with NBC is set to expire in September 2019 and as such all other WWE shows are in search of a new home on a different network. As per reports, only RAW will be kept on the NBC Universal programming. FOX has proposed a bid to bring Smackdown Live onto their network. This partnership will result in Smackdown Live being moved to Friday nights instead of Tuesdays.
I think that this new deal with FOX is going to be great for the WWE brand, making it more accessible to greater amounts of people and increasing viewership significantly. Friday night is a very appropriate night to house a weekly time slot for a sport as rowdy as WWE. As great as I think this partnership will be, I still believe that it will come with some challenges. Smackdown Live risks being in competition with other programming.
FOX was not the only party who made a bid to take over Smackdown Live. Another offer was made to WWE which was higher than that of FOX however, WWE agreed to partner with FOX as they believed this is the best platform to promote their brand. FOX is already partnered with other sporting leagues such as NFL and MLB. The contract between FOX and WWE is said to be worth more than $1 billion, which breaks down to $205 million a year paid to WWE. It is safe to assume that because Smackdown Live will be taking over a primetime slot Friday nights, that the show will now become a three hour episode. This is something I'm very excited about because this means that the longer the show and the more viewers who will be watching, we can anticipate that Smackdown will get a bit of a creative rejuventation which will spark and attract more viewers.
Nick
No comments:
Post a Comment