2023 has been a massive year for WWE.
A banner year.
One of the most successful years the company has ever had.
So why, in that same year, have they lost their biggest deal in SmackDown on Fox, which
will be moving back to the smaller USA Network in 2024.
Because, simply put, WWE failed on Fox.
At least, that’s what Fox believe.
Once the Endeavour merger deal finished - where WWE and UFC came together under a new group
called TKO - it was reported that Nick Khan and Ari Emmanual would be working on getting
new TV deals for Raw, SmackDown and NXT, with WWE looking to increase the rights fees they
got for their last deals in 2019.
And that was already a lot of money.
WWE announced in June of 2018 that SmackDown would be moving off USA Network to the much
bigger station of Fox on Fridays.
Fox was one of the four biggest broadcast channels.
This was the most eyes that WWE would have on its product on TV, ever.
As Joseph Currier wrote about the deal in a 2018 Figure Four Weekly, it was “the zenith
of everything WWE has been attempting to achieve as a corporation.”
It was a massive deal for WWE - orchestrated by then new-comer to the company Nick Khan
- and it netted the WWE $205 million per year over 5 years, translating to over $1 billion.
It netted Khan a seat at the WWE table in 2020.
That number is crazy when you think when SmackDown first moved to NBCUniversal in 2010 - the
home of USA Network - the show was only worth $30 million.
In September of 2023, that deal was announced as coming to an end.
This ‘zenith’ deal that WWE had worked so hard to get, was over.
WWE announced that SmackDown was heading back to USA Network in October of 2024.
So, I know what you’re thinking.
Wasn’t the Fox deal going well for WWE?
Aren’t the ratings for WWE much higher than they have been previously?
Isn’t this the banner year for the company?
And you’re right, but Fox - clearly - don’t agree, as Fox CEO Lachlan Murdoch said on
an earnings call that, “we wish them luck and we've moved on from them.”
Fox didn’t even bid to keep them.
So, what happened?
To find out, let’s go back to 2019.
When SmackDown signed with Fox, it ceased to be an ‘entertainment’ show, as it was
put on Fox Sports.
SmackDown was now a sports show.
And SmackDown was sold to Fox on the idea of having real sports people on it.
The debut episode of SmackDown on Fox, airing in October of 2019, saw Brock Lesnar win the
WWE Championship in his first singles match on TV since 2004, which also came with the
debut of Cain Velasquez, Braun Strowman start an angle with Tyson Fury, and an appearance
from The Rock.
The latter was done to bump the rating and put over the celebrity power of WWE as a brand,
while the other two led to dud matches at that year’s Crown Jewel.
It would be the only match Cain Valasquez had in WWE, and it went about 2 minutes.
Sorry, Kofi.
The show was advertised to be loaded with legends like Steve Austin, Mick Foley, The
Undertaker, Ric Flair and Hulk Hogan, but only The Rock appeared on the show in any
real capacity.
Dave Meltzer said at the time, the expectation from those inside of Fox was for the show
to get around 4.5 million viewers.
That would be an increase of 2.5 million viewers from the last episode of SmackDown on USA.
You can see why this was thought to be a huge deal for the company.
That debut episode of SmackDown didn’t quite hit that mark.
What it did get was a company record viewership of 3.86 million viewers.
Amonster number for WWE, and only beaten - in time-relevant data - by the Raw 25th Anniversary
episode from 2018 which was also a nostalgia-heavy cameo show.
More impressively for SmackDown, it got a 1.4 in the 18-49 demo, which is the number
Fox would be really interested in.
So, yeah, while it wasn’t the 4.5 million they wanted (and indeed thought they’d get),
the 1.4 demo rating was higher than the expected 1.0.
Which means we’re off to a good start.
Fox also did lots of crossover with WWE on their other sports shows, and commissioned
WWE Backstage - a show hosted by Renee Young and Booker T - which even saw the return of
CM Punk.
Also, look how mad this photo is.
83% of that photo went on to work for AEW.
Punk’s return was a Fox call.
They wanted him on the show, even if WWE didn’t.
But Backstage didn’t pull in the ratings they wanted.
They would bump when Punk was on the show, but it would average around the 100,000 mark,
which was way below what the preview episodes did which was five times as much.
The reason the show failed, is because WWE wouldn’t let it be the show Fox wanted it
to be.
WWE Backstage was supposed to a warts-and-all news show, but it regularly glossed over actual
news in WWE - for example, the controversail Saudi Arabia deal.
Fans saw the show for what it was, and in June of 2020, Fox announced it was cancelling
the show.
Not because of COVID, but because Fox, “was spending too much on the show considering
the ratings [it was] drawing.”
But it wasn’t just WWE Backstage that saw its ratings fall by Fox standards.
The debut SmackDown got 3.86 million viewers, but just two months later, the show was averaging
2.3 million viewers.
The Pandemic didn’t help matters, as wrestling didn’t connect the way it did with fans
in attendance.
The first episode of 2020 got 2.4 million viewers, the first episode of 2021 got 1.9
million.
In September 2021, Fightful Select reported that the relationship between WWE and Fox
was beginning to strain, writing that a source within Fox told them, “the WWE viewership
was disappointing in comparison to expectations.”
Another sticking point of conflict came earlier in the year when WWE announced that the WWE
Network would be moving to Peacock, a streaming service owned by NBCUniversal - the former
home of SmackDown and the current home of Raw.
This meant that SmackDown on Fox would be promoting PPVs that would be streaming on
a rival service.
Fox, at the time, were said to be “not over the moon” about this.
This came to a head in June of 2021, when WWE were promoting their Hell in a Cell PPV,
and Fox wanted a Hell in a Cell match to take place on SmackDown because Peacock were getting
two on PPV, so Roman Reigns vs. Rey Mysterio was moved off the Peacock PPV and put on TV
for free on Fox instead.
NBCUniversal, annoyed that Fox was getting a Hell in a Cell match for free on TV, demanded
they also get one, which saw Bobby Lashley beat Xavier Woods on Raw, just one night after
Lashley beat Drew McIntyre in a Hell in a Cell match on PPV.
WWE did four Hell in a Cell matches in a four day period.
A WWE source told Fightful that if Fox wanted the PPV content so badly, they should have
paid for it like Peacock did.
It then comes as no surprise that Fightful Select reported that the TV series ‘The
United States of America vs. Vince McMahon’ - which was to cover the steroid trial of
the 1990s - was set to portray Fox’s owner Rupert Murdoch in a “less than flattering
way”, which a Fox source called “a childish move”, and it only soured the relationship
further.
But, in all of this, is the Pandemic.
And even though Fox were unhappy with the viewership numbers SmackDown was getting,
they admitted that the Pandemic played a part, and would wait and see how it bounced back
with fans in attendance - especially after loading SmackDown with the likes of John Cena,
Becky Lynch and Brock Lesnar following Summerslam.
The first rating after that show?
2.8 million.
The following week?
2.1.
Then 2.2.
Then 2.1.
Then just 2.
In November and December of 2021, the show wasn’t even breaking the 2 million mark
anymore.
Ratings have since bounced back under Triple H’s regime, with SmackDown hitting highs
of 2.5 and 2.6 million when Roman Reigns is on show, and a standard 2.1 - 2.3 when he’s
not.
While high for the world of wrestling - and it’s often the highest rated show on the
network outside of major sports - the ratings are not what Fox expected, and not the ratings
Fox paid for.
Not only were WWE not hitting the overall viewership number, the 18-49 demo also wasn’t
hitting the mark either, usually around a 0.6.
On that earnings call, when Fox CEO Lachlan Murdoch announced they didn’t even bid to
keep SmackDown on their network, he said: “We were not hitting the advertising numbers
due to the audience of WWE to make the return for our return on investment to be above the
levels that we would accept.”
Translation: it’s your fault SmackDown is no longer on Fox.
Dave Meltzer noted in the Wrestling Observer Newsletter that Fox lost money on their $205
million investment because, “even with the strong 18-49 numbers, a lot of advertisers
had a negative view of wrestling fans” and thus, ad rates were lower on Fox for SmackDown
than they were for other sports.
After five years of SmackDown on Fox, it all boiled down to advertisers thinking wrestling
fans are poor.
And the most insane thing about all of this is that Meltzer predicted this would be the
case back in 2018 when they announced the deal in the first place writing, “Historically,
the view was that wrestling fans were at the low end of the socio-economic scale and thus,
even with historically good numbers that date back to the advent of television, wrestling
could never monetize those numbers like major sports.”
But, it’s WWE that are the real winners here.
As Oli talked about in his Roman Reigns video, WWE are doing better live show numbers, better
merchandising numbers - higher than the Attitude Era - and they’ve just signed bigger TV
rights deals.
They may have wanted more - reportedly having an asking price of $307 million per year - but
WWE’s deal with NBCUniversal to move SmackDown back to USA Network was worth $287 million
per year over five years - a 40% increase on the Fox deal.
WWE also announced big news for NXT, which will be moving from USA Network to the CW
in October of 2024, and Deadline reported that this five-year deal would be worth “more
than double” the $15 million that NBCUniversal were paying for it.
Ari Emmanual stated on a TKO earnings call that it was - in fact - an increase of 70%.
It’s interesting here that CW was set to be a rumoured home for Billy Corgan’s NWA,
though Fightful Select report that talks between WWE and CW have been going on for months,
and - much like SmackDown moving to Fox - this deal would put NXT on a network that puts
more eyes on it than it currently has.
Fightful add that WWE are very happy with this deal, as are talent backstage.
Someone not so happy will be Billy Corgan and his NWA.
Fightful Select report that those they spoke to in NWA were “surprised” and “blindsided”
by the announcement, as they were working on a deal with CW that would have seen Powerrr
air on the network as well as a reality show based around the promotion.
NWA might still pursue a deal with them, but WWE sources told Fightful Select they, “do
not expect that to happen at this point.”
Haus of Wrestling reported that an angle on the most recent NWA PPV - where Father James
Mitchell had a cocaine party with wrestlers - upset CW and might have soured any deal
the two had.
They add that Corgan was told that the network would not be watching the PPV, and they only
found out when they were flooded with complaints on social media about the angle.
Translation: it’s your fault that NWA is not going to be on the CW.
So that’s SmackDown and NXT with new homes - and new increases in revenue - so where
does that leave Raw?
Dave Meltzer noted on Wrestling Observer Radio that the rumour mill is that they will either
stay on USA Network, or move to FX - or even strike a deal with WBD, the current home of
All Elite Wrestling.
While a crazy situation, Meltzer calls it a “long shot”, but adds that “Analysts
believe they’re going to get a 42% increase” when they do find a new deal.
So, what did we learn from this?
Firstly, the ratings argument by Fox is likely just an excuse.
The ratings were lower than expected, but ratings across TV are down because TV is different
now than they were five years ago, let alone a decade or so ago.
WWECW and TNA drew more viewers that AEW currently does, but those shows barely cracked the top
20 watched shows, while AEW is often ranked number one.
What you get with wrestling, though (and why NBCUniversal and CW are throwing money to
get it) is brand new weekly TV that has a consistent audience.
Really, the issues between Fox and WWE are outside of this ratings argument.
Fox were sold on WWE having big time sports names like Brock Lesnar, Cain Valasquez, Tyson
Fury and Ronda Rousey.
Some of those names aren’t there all the time, and some of those names only had one
match in WWE.
They also promised celebrity names and legends like The Rock and Steve Austin, but they’re
not there all the time either.
They wanted WWE to re-sign CM Punk but WWE didn’t.
The Peacock thing didn’t help much, either.
Four Hell in a Cell matches in FOUR DAYS.
But, as with a lot of things in recent times, WWE are the real winners here.
They may have lost out on the big-time Fox deal - this zenith deal - but they’re still
the hottest ticket in town and have just increased their SmackDown TV revenue by 40%, NXT by
over 50% and Raw is looking to be nearly 50% too.
We also learned that you’re a wrestling fan and advertisers think you’re poor and
stupid.
So stop being poor and stupid.
Oli Davis did a deep dive on the fan backlash to Roman Reigns as WWE Champion and has discovered
that not is all as it seems - click the video on screen now to find out more.
Thank you all for watching.