Fox Making Big Push for WWE Broadcasting Rights

This could be big. One of the big stories coming up for WWE over the rest of the year is where will their home be on Monday nights. WWE has been on the USA Network since 2005 in their current stint with both “Monday Night Raw” and “Smackdown Live” airing on the network. However, a new deal might be coming up that would change things in a very big way.

Raw on USA certainly has its memories.

Watch the opening to Raw 25

According to the Sporting News, Fox Sports is now making a push towards the WWE broadcasting rights. The plan would see “Monday Night Raw” broadcast on the Fox network while “Smackdown Live” would air on Fox Sports 1, a cable channel. Formal negotiations can begin in the spring and a decision is expected between May and September of this year. If Fox does acquire WWE programming, it would drop the UFC programming that it currently airs. WWE’s current deal with NBC Universal expires on September 30, 2019 so if the deal takes place, it won’t be kicking in for a good while.

Opinion: If this happens, it could be anywhere between amazing to a disaster for WWE. The problem is very simple: how much money is Fox going to pump into “Monday Night Raw” on a top network if it doesn’t draw the right kind of money? Also, what happens if Fox decides they have a different vision for what they’re putting their money into? An eventual outright sale wouldn’t shock me either, but that’s looking very far down the line.

And here’s how “Smackdown” got started.