AEW Facing Significant Issue Over TV Rights
AEW’s US broadcast partner Warner Brothers Discovery is facing a fight to keep hold of NBA rights and that could mean big things for Tony Khan’s company.
2024 is slated to be perhaps the most important in AEW history as the company negotiates new TV rights in the United States. Since the company was founded in 2019, AEW programming has aired on TBS and TNT, networks owned by Warner Brothers Discovery.
While the wrestling company’s ratings are a hot topic of discussion every week, perhaps a bigger priority for the media conglomerate is keeping hold of its NBA coverage.
AEW Facing Wait On NBA Rights Deal
Speaking on Wrestling Observer Radio, Dave Meltzer explained that whether or not WBD keeps its NBA coverage could have a massive effect on AEW one way or the other:
It’s a really hard one to answer. On one hand, you would make the argument that if WBD loses the NBA that it would need AEW more because they don’t have the NBA and they need programming which draws ratings. On the other hand, their carriage fees for TNT would probably go way, way down so their revenue would go way, way down.
You could make the argument that they would have far less money to spend and that’s not good for AEW. At the same time when you say that they’d have far less money to spend, the reality is if you take the NBA rights that they’re already paying away – even though they’d have less money gross coming in – they would probably have way more money to spend.
As a station, it would greatly downgrade TNT losing the NBA, their overall standing would go way, way down. However this NBA thing turns out, and it’s not looking good, at this moment for TNT retaining the NBA, it does have a pretty significant effect on the negotiations with AEW in multiple ways.
Tony Khan caused controversy with recent comments likening WWE to Harvey Weinstein as he dominated headlines during the NFL Draft where he appeared in a neck brace following The Elite’s attack on him on Dynamite.