AEW May See Big Negative Change With Next Television Rights Deals

AEW is still booking as much television as they can in an attempt to garner attention from the fan base. They call Warner Bros Discovery their television home with TBS and TNT, but only time will tell if they keep that spot.

The television landscape is always changing, and live sports is still king when it comes to programming. That being said, Warner Bros Discovery may have other priorities soon enough.

There is a rumor going around that Universal may buy Warner Bros Discovery at this point. At this point, if that deal does go down, it may not be the best thing for AEW, as Dave Meltzer said on Wrestling Observer Radio as he addressed the rumor. The current state of television rights fees as a whole also plays into things.

“There’s a million things […] the thing is that it’s not promising for AEW to get the deal they would have got a year ago, because things have changed. And, you know, it didn’t look promising for, basically NASCAR is getting a smaller increase, and NASCAR is higher priority than WWE, obviously much higher than AEW.”

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It was noted that the AEW deal has a lot to do with the NBA’s television deal when it goes up. If Warner Bros Discovery is able to keep the NBA, then they may not pick them back up, or offer them quite as much. If the NBA leaves WBD, then that will make AEW programming so much more valuable for the network.

AEW has two weekly live shows, two hours each, with Dynamite and Collision. Rampage is a taped hour-long show as well, so that gives Tony Khan five hours every week on WBD stations. Only time will tell how that arrangement may change in the time to come.

What’s your take on AEW’s television rights deals? Do you think that they need to cut one of their shows? Let us know what you think in the comments section!

Transcription by Ringside News