By Jason Powell, ProWrestling.net Editor (@prowrestlingnet)
AEW and Warner Bros. Discovery are on the verge of announcing a new media rights agreement. John Ourand of Puck reports that it is expected to be a four-year deal with three years guaranteed and a one-year option with two shows airing twice per week on TNT, TBS, and Tru TV. Ourand adds that $170 million per year “is apparently in the ballpark.” The deal could be announced as soon as next week. Read more at Puck.news.
Powell’s POV: Ourand is a longtime sports business reporter. He also reported that AEW is pitching a separate package to broadcast networks. There are some big questions coming out of this report. Does the roughly $170 million per year agreement include pay-per-views being part of the Max streaming service in some way? Is there an additional streaming component that would lead to AEW’s historical content and weekly television replays being available on Max? Will the two shows be Dynamite and Collision, meaning Rampage is finished? If so, will the shows remain two hours or will another hour be added to one or both shows? Did they put the quarterly (and uneventful) Battle of the Belts specials out of their misery? It will be nice to have answers to these questions once they finally announce the new deal.
The number one thing by far for me anyway is the ppvs.Fingers crossed they’ll be on MAX.
Interesting. Ourand is generally solid as a reporter but the one place that Puck has been proven to have posted factually incorrect information is their sports section (the Eminem Super Bowl story).
If the $170/yr is true it’s a nice increase but well below the supposed billion that Tony was pushing previously.