Before the new UFC U.S. media rights deal on Paramount begins in 2026, the two brands are already expanding on it.
Announced on Tuesday, Paramount (via parent company Skydance) and UFC (via parent company TKO) revealed a new seven-year media rights deal that will add Latin America and Australia to the mix via the Paramount+ streaming service, aligning them with the U.S. rights.
Like with the U.S. rights, the deal begins this January.
While the Latin America rights are identical to the U.S. which includes 13 numbered (formerly PPV) events and 30 Fight Night cards, the Australia portion includes just the Fight Night shows and prelims for the UFC numbered shows. That is because UFC PPVs are available on Kayo Sports via a multi-year deal announced in January 2024.
Notes from the new issue which apparently has been the talk of the social media wrestling world: *Seth Rollins injury and how this will lead to numerous changes in booking plans, including what was scheduled short and long-term for Rollins through Mania and after. *Full coverage of Crown Jewel, business notes and match coverage *The Media Ratings Council has questions about the new numbers *Just how far Smackdown has dropped with younger viewers based on the new sampling and NXT isn’t much different, nor is AEW *Konosuke Takeshita beats Zack Sabre Jr. to win the IWGP title, a look at King of Prm Wrestling, WrestleKingdom, first thoughts on Aaron Wolf, and the angles on the show *WrestleDream preview, business notes, as well as Saturday Night’s Main Event in Salt Lake City needs the entire show revamped *Odds for upcoming big matches *TNA Bound for Glory notes *A detailed story on WWE cuts focusing on Ridge Holland and WEs Lee *Pro Wrestling NOAH at Sumo Hall *A huge story on the 2025 Hall of Fame U.S. & Canada candidates *What the awards voting over the last 45 years says about those who fare better not in than those who are in. *The most detailed look at the ratings for all the wrestling shows of the past week *It women’s month at Arena Mexico but one person is still the star, a look at the recent main events *A look at two PPV shows from Arena Mexico coming *Who is the obvious choice for tag team of the year that nobody is talking about *Best of the Super Juniors tournament *Japanese referee dies in bear attack *Update on Smashing Machine business *They named a bridge after Stu Hart and more notes *NFL star copying Ric Flair *Fantastica Mania UK *The Andrade situation *Lots of background details on similar stories *Kota Ibushi update *Notes on Chris Jericho and Britt Baker *Darby Allin talks about the cancers that used to be in AEW *Update on a training camp for AEW in Asheville, NC *Rematch of a match of the year candidate coming to AEW show in Edinburg, TX *Updates on YouTube numbers for September *Debate over the new and old Ali Act *Details on Zuffa Boxing deals *How much UFC makes in profit per Saturday show *New UFC fights *Sad BJ Penn story *Stories on fighters getting screwed by promoters *Ticket demand for John Cena’s ast show *New WWE hire, usage of AI for wrestling storylines and some are worried about their jobs *AJ Styles talks retiring *WWE injury updates
— Both of our weekend shows are up on the site today. On Friday’s show we talked about all the news of the week from the Observer including AI booking and the future, card changes, WrestleDream as well as talked to James Dixon on his book about 1992 WWE and the fall of the company from its 1985-91 strong period, with Bret Hart as champion, steroid testing, Hulk Hogan leaving, Ultimate Warrior failing and more. Last night’s show talked about WrestleDream, WWE injury updates and more.
— There were three issues technically with last night’s WrestleDream show. It’s weird that it was three, from three different providers, none related to issues from AEW and three totally different problems. There were no problems with places like PPV.com, YouTube, Triller and other platforms.
The biggest problem was with Amazon Prime, which cut the show off at midnight, just a few minutes into the Jon Moxley vs. Darby Allin I Quit match. They had a power failure on their internal rebroadcast system which caused the outage and this also impacted other sports broadcasts that were going on. It also cut out during the Mercedes Mone vs. Mina Shirakawa match. We heard from a number of people who complained and got refunds, so this is going to impact the PPV revenue negatively.
The other big problem was at the start of the show with Comcast. Apparently they configured the program wrong in their system so many people couldn’t buy the show. At least some homes on HBO MAX lost the sound during the pre-show. It was fine long before the PPV started.
— There was not a time management issue as the show was booked for the FTR vs. Jet Speed match to end up mostly on the PPV. It was a new idea to make it unpredictable on pre-shows that you know the finish is coming before the top of the hour. It was the right match to test this out as they opened the match hot and then the show itself opened hot being mid-match. It helped a lot that they had a great match, because they could not do a slow build or normal style as they had to peak early and open the PPV portion at 4:00 into the match and it had to be very hot as well at that point.
— The reason the Mercedes Mone match wasn’t announced ahead of time is that they wanted to have her break the Ultimo Dragon record on the show last night, rather than tonight in Winnipeg. But if they had pushed it prior to late Friday night, it would have given away that she wasn’t losing her CMLL women’s title to Persephone. Unlike WWE, which doesn’t concern itself with spoiling a finish to a show in Mexico, AEW does. But it led to adding a match with zero build at the last minute.
— I don’t know that I’ve ever seen a shot with three tag team matches of the quality of Brody King & Bandido vs. Konosuke Takeshita & Kazuchika Okada, Young Bucks vs. Jurassic Express and FTR vs. JetSpeed.
— They also announced for Wednesday in San Antonio that the Opps, now heels, face Bobby Lashley & Shelton Benjamin & MVP for the trios titles and Okada vs. Bandido for the Unified title.
— They did not have a strong walk up in St. Louis due to bad weather in the city. It was not sold out although for a U.S. show, the crowd response and heat through most of the show was excellent.
— We’re looking for your thoughts on the show so you can leave a thumbs up, thumbs down or thumbs in the middle along with a best and worst match for WrestleDream to [email protected]
— We’re also looking for reports from the WWE shows this weekend in Tokyo and the RevPro Fantastica Mania shows from Wolverhampton, UK, and today’s Winnipeg Pro Wrestling show where Mone goes after her 12th belt when she faces WPW women’s champion Jody Threat.
— Bad news from an interest level is that WrestleDream did not place in the top few hundred searches. It used to regularly hit the top 20 and was not even top 500. The UFC show yesterday had 120,000 searches which isn’t bad for a Fight Night only on ESPN. For the weekend, the only searches from combat sports in the top 100 were the death of Duke Ruogas at No. 55 and Brendan Allen, who won the UFC main event, at No. 96.
— On the UFC show, they did a tribute to Roufas with Paul Felder, who trained under Roufas. Roufas, a former world champion kickboxer and brother of Rick “The Jet” Roufas, the top U.S. kickboxing star of his era, opened Roufasport in Milwaukee and trained and was a father figure to a open of Midwest fighters, notably Anthony & Sergio Pettis, Stephan Bonnar, Felder and he was also the trainer of CM Punk.
— The Seth Rollins situation and World title situation will be addressed at Raw tomorrow in Sacramento, CA. It will be back to an 8 p.m. start. There are 8,000 tickets out, lower than usual for a TV shoot in that market, but San Jose had a healthy walkup and came close to selling out Friday night. I think SOME of the weakness in advances as compared to the post-Zayn turning on Reigns period and Rhodes explosion are people waiting to buy late figuring they can get tickets at a better price. It’s the same reason the John Cena retirement show didn’t instantly sell out even though the demand was there.
— Paramount, under the ownership of Dvid Ellison, is expected to lay off between 2,000 and 3,000 employees in an attempt to cut $2 billion in costs. The job cuts are expected to be across the board. Part of the reason for the cuts is the $1.1 billion per year deal that Paramount signed with UFC. Another reason is they are expected to make a stronger bid to buy WBD.
— DDT will be running Ultimate Party 2025 on 11/3 at Sumo Hall. The top two matches have IWGP champion Konosuke Takeshita & celebrity Kaisei Takechi (he’s like Logan Paul in his ability to catch on to this) vs. Kazusada Higuchi & Takeshi Masada, Zack Sabre Jr. vs. Chris Brookes in a dream match and a title vs. title match with KO-D champion Yuki Ueno facing Universal champion Minoru Suzuki.
— It was major news yesterday about the death of Sam Rivera, the bass guitar player for Limp Bizkit, who performed Undertaker’s theme at WrestleMania 19.
— 60s, 70s and 80s announcer Boyd Pierce would have turned 97 today.
— British wrestling legend Kendo Nagasaki (Peter Thornlehy) turned either 79 or 84 today. I’m sure someone will let us know which one is accurate. Julia “Sweet Saraya” Bevis, the mother of Paige/Saraya, turns 54 today. Toni Storm turns 30 today. Mike Hegstrand/Road Warrior Hawk died 22 years ago today. Lia Maivia, the grandmother of Dwayne Johnson and former promoter in Hawaii passed away 17 years ago today. Mike Graham committed suicide 13 years ago today (thanks to Tony Richards)
— Regarding Ace Steel’s reaction to Tony Khan, while I would not compare Jon Moxley to Harley Race, the idea of being a multi-time world champion is similar. But what a freaking crazy overreaction when Steel said, “Count this as one of the dumbest and most blasphemous things I’ve ever read, utter crap, really infuriating zero comparison.” Steel was tight with Race and evidently not with Moxley. Then again, when I first saw the Young Bucks live as heels against Josh Alexander & Ethan Page, about five minutes into the match it was like just the way they worked, did big moves and controlled the crowd and made their opponents look so good, it was very clear they were like the Midnight Express in the mid to late 80s except using modern moves and a faster pacing. As you can imagine, many people blew gaskets even though a ton of top wrestlers who study both teams have told me the same thing. Hatred is not a good trait.
— Dungeon Wrestling from Friday night in Calgary before 450 fans: Michael Allen Richard Clarke b Bryce Hanson, Chris Knight b Scorpious, Ava Lawless & Kat Von Heez b Riley Rose & Sage Morin, Mo Jabari b Sheldon Jean to keep the Jericho Cruise Oceanic title, Rohan Raja b Tommy Billington (AEW) to keep the PW Grail title, Tiger Raj Singh b Harlow Abott, Raj Dhesi (Jinder Mahal) b Matt Riddle to retain the Stu Hart Heritage title. (thanks to Ross Hart)
— Boca Raton Championship Wrestling on 11/2 at the VIP Ballroom Ricky Morton vs. son Kerry Morton, plus Bull James, Cezar Bononi, Stallion Rogers, Matt Riddle, Bobby Fish, EJ Nduka, Lacey Lane and Jonny Fairplay.
— A documentary on Gama Singh of Stampede Wrestling fame debuted last night at the International Film Festival in Toronto. It debuts streaming on Crave on Monday.
The new issue of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter is up on the site:
*In depth with the changes in ratings, are pro wrestling and MMA being undercounted, are they less popular than we thought, how the changes have happened, streaming, how this relates to baseball, football, and other entertainment shows. *John Cena’s last matches, and the surprises in current WWE booking plans for now until December. *A look at Crown Jewel and WrestleDream, the cards, how the shows look and the current interest level in them. *Favorites in the betting in all the major future matches *A look at The Smashing Machine, the heyday of Mark Kerr, the box office and what we’ve learned, comparisons with Iron Claw, the performances by Dwayne Johnson Emily Blunt and Ryan Bader and the Pride Grand Prix in 2000 with Sakuraba vs. Gracie and key what ifs that people don’t’ talk about *All In Texas attendance and how much the state will be paying AEW based on the deal, plus original plans for that week and three shows that were once thought and talked about but didn’t happen with two international promotions. *Full coverage of UFC 320, what’s next for the winners, the business side of things and match-by-match. *The most complete and detailed look at the ratings for all the major shows as well as comparisons with last year, segment-by-semgent notes, demos and more. *Expectations of when a major milestone in history of buildings that house wrestling will be reached and when 1 million fans in one specific building attending wrestling in a year is expected *King of Pro Wrestling thoughts *New Japan’s last major show looked at *40th anniversary of a landmark tag team event taking place *Hulk Hogan’s widow looking at medical malpractice suit *Death of the former Sabrina *Dave Bautista makes surprising revelation *Mistico vs. Bndido in Xalapa *Renee Dupree talks the old WWE locker room *Bound for Glory notes *Lots of injury and contract updates *The story of Ultimo Dragon’s ten belts and Mercedes Mone beating that record *Sting’s son has his first match *Advance tickets sales for the WWE & AEW shows over the next two months *The strange secret suspension of Conor McGregor *More on the White House show *MMA Fight of the year on the Dana White Contenders Series *Has the WWE boom period ended or is it ending? *The WWE product right now *Jimmy Jacobs talks differences in backstage at WWE and TNA
— Both of our weekend shows are up on the site. Our Friday show was the third and final Hall of Fame installment with John Muse, Ethan Tyler and Phil Lions talking about the non-wrestler category and other thoughts, plus we covered the rest of the news for the week. Last night’s show covered Crown Jewel, Survivor Series plans, Arena Mexico, AEW and TNA show news and more.
— WBD rejected a $20 per share takeover offer by Paramount Skydance. The sides are continuing to negotiate. The ramifications of this are far bigger than the pro wrestling world, but whatever the WBD ownership ends up being could have an effect on pro wrestling in many different ways.
— The estimates for the weekend are that Smashing Machine will finish No. 8 for the week with $1.77 million. A normal second week drop from the first is 50 percent. This was a 69 percent drop from an already disappointing first week. Conversely, Iron Claw dropped only six percent in the second week. So those were polar opposites. I wrote a story on the movie in the current issue looking back at that era and the career of Mark Kerr. Overall I thought it was a good movie but at the end of the day, it did not have commercial appeal.
— Kota Ibushi had surgery for the broken femur suffered on Wednesday night when he fell badly off the top rope in his match with Josh Alexander that aired last night. It was weird doing that impromptu post-match angle with Mark Davis. Ibushi today talked about being out 18 months, thanking Tony Khan for sending him flowers and a note and said that he was considering retirement at first but does want to come back. This is a nasty fluke injury for a guy who took years to come back from the shoulder injury suffered at a time when he was one of the best in-ring performers in history.
— TNA’s Bound for Glory takes place in Lowell, MA tonight at the Paul Tsongas Center. hey were at 6,275 tickets out earlier today so this will be one of the biggest crowds in the 23 year history of the company:
Call Your Shot Gauntlet Battle Royal
Tessa Blanchard vs. Gia Miler
Frankie Kazarian vs. Steve Maclin for the International title
Moose & Brian Myers & Eddie Edwards & JDC & Alisha Edwards vs. Mustafa Ali & Special Agent 0 & Jason Hotch & John Skyler & Tasha Steelz in a hardcore war match
The Iinspiration vs. Heather by Elegance & Ash by Elegance for the Knockouts tag titles
Leon Slater vs. Je’Von Evans for the X title
The Hardys vs. Team 3-D in a tables match for the NXT & TNA tag titles
Keliani Jordan vs. Indi Hartwell for the Knockouts title
Trick Williams vs. Mike Santana for the TNA title. They have to switch the title here, right?
BDE, a YouTuber (Brandon Collymore) will be in the Gauntlet match.
— New Japan King of Pro Wrestling starts at 3 a.m. Eastern time tonight or midnight Pacific from Sumo Hall in Tokyo. It has a hell of a lineup:
Sareee vs. Syuri for the IWGP women’s title
Shingo Takagi & Hiromu Takahashi & Titan vs. David Finlay & Taiji Ishimori & Clark Connors
Sanada vs. Drilla Moloney no DQ no count outs
Hirooki Goto (first match back since filming Street Fighter 2) & Yoshi-Hashi & Yoh vs. Ryohei Oiwa & Hartley Jackson & Kosei Fujita
El Phantasmo vs. Hiroshi Tanahashi for NJPW TV title
Oleg Botin vs. Evil for Never title
Yuto-Ice & Oskar vs. Yuya Umeura & Shota Umino for IWGP tag team titles
Gabe Kidd vs. Yota Tsuji for Global title
Zack Sabre Jr. vs. Konosuke Takeshita for the IWGP world title
— We are doing weekend polls for WWE Crown Jewel, TNA Bound for Glory and New Japan King of Pro Wrestling this weekend. You can leave a thumbs up, thumbs down or thumbs in the middle along with a best and worst match to [email protected]
— We’re looking for reports from the NXT shows in Detroit and Cleveland this weekend with results, finishes and highlights to [email protected]
— For Google searches this weekend, Crown Jewel has 115,000 searches which is a little more than half of a normal show. However, the UFC show yesterday from Rio de Janeiro had virtually nothing, much lower than usual. The death of Diane Keaton was more than 10 million which speaks volumes for how well known and remembered she was. A funny one is that Logan Paul had 10,000 weekend searches due to a bogus rumor that he was killed in a helicopter crash.
— Lots of rumors that Alexandre Pantoja will defend the flyweight title against Joshua Van on the last UFC PPV for at least seven years, if not ever, on 12/13 at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas.
— The main story coming out of yesterday’s win by Charles Oliveira as he broke his own records for most finishes (21) and most submissions (17) in a career with a win over Mateusz Gamrot in the main event. He immediately set his sights on Max Holloway next.
— In a cool touch, Jose Aldo came to the ring and left his gloves in the cage. He didn’t fight on the show but UFC allowed the Hall of Fame fighter to retire in Rio de Janeiro.
— The Philadelphia Inquirer had a story on Scott “Raven” Levy with the documentary “Nevermore” on his career having a screening in the city. (thanks to Chuck Langerman and Bill King)
— Laura Sanko will be announcing the UFC 321 PPV show from Abu Dhabi on 10/25. This will only be the third time a woman has broadcasted a UFC PPV. Sanko did it at UFC 293 and Kathy Long did it at UFC 1.
— Go Shiozaki resurfaced in All Japan yesterday as the mystery partner of Shotaro Ashino in a match with Kento Miyahara & Hideki Suzuki in Gyoda. Miyahara was disqualified quickly and this set up a 10/22 Triple Crown title match at Korakuen Hall which should sell out.
— Former NXT wrestler Yoshiki Inamura returned to NOAH and will challenge KENTA for the GHC title on 11/8 at Korakuen Hall.
— House of Glory Wrestling from Friday night in New York: Zilla Fatu b Bear Bronson to keep the Crown Jewel title, Indi Hartell b Zayda Steel to keep the women’s title, Raheem Royal b Idris Jackson, Killer Kross b Matt Cardona, Leon Slater b Amazing Red to keep the TNA X Division title, Hardys b Mane Event in a TNA vs. HOG title match so the Hardys now have three sets of belts, Charles Mason b Man Like DeReiss to keep the HOG title. The next show i s 11/15 in Long Island, NY. (thanks to Samuel Rosenthal)
In the constantly changing world of content creation, Paramount Skydance — one of the newest media partners for TKO — is reportedly preparing to make a bid for primary AEW media partner Warner Bros. Discovery.
On Thursday, the Wall Street Journal first reported that the David Ellison-backed Paramount Skydance is preparing to offer a majority cash bid for the entire company which would include the TV side and movies /streaming side which were set to split in 2026.
No official bid has been made and any such move would result in U.S. regulatory approval which, given the relationships between the Ellison family and the Trump regime, is not seen as an impedance. It’s unknown how much the offer would be for given WBD’s current debt load of roughly $35 billion.
Ellison’s Skydance recently closed on the sale for Paramount and all of its assets for $8.4 billion and then shortly thereafter, acquired the domestic TV rights for UFC events for seven years and more than $7 billion to air on the streaming service.
While Paramount doesn’t have any pro wrestling content on its platform, WBD certainly does with AEW whose deal runs through 2027 with an option year held by WBD.
Wrestling Observer Radio with Bryan Alvarez and Dave Meltzer is back with tons to talk about including RAW from Monday night, what’s going on with AJ Lee, the UFC on Paramount deal, Dave’s thoughts on the CMLL Grand Prix match this weekend, plus some mailbag questions and more! A fun show as always so check it out~!
Timestamps: Start: ‘The Smashing Machine’ premieres at Venice Film Festival, The Rock’s slimmed-down new look 4:58: More on UFC/Paramount deal 12:24: Dave’s CMLL Grand Prix thoughts, ROH Death Before Dishonor streaming problems 23:53: AEW Dynamite & NXT lineups, more on Buford Pusser 29:20: AJ Lee possibly returning, WWE Raw recap 52:36: Q&A
Dave Meltzer and I, Garrett Gonzales, are back with the Friday edition of Wrestling Observer Radio, talking about all the big news from today’s Wrestling Observer Newsletter.
Here were some of the things we discussed:
Dave’s lead story on the Paramount/UFC deal
Rumors about Lorenzo Fertita being a possible buyer for TNA
WWE counter-programming AEW
AEW ratings
All of the shows this weekend including the G-1 semis, TripleMania, & UFC 319
After heavy speculation on what the UFC would do with their media rights package, TKO announced on Monday morning that the world’s largest MMA organization is heading to Paramount in a transformative, all-inclusive media rights deal in the United States.
The seven-year, $7.7 billion ($1.1 billion average annual value) begins in January 2026 and will see 13 numbered events and 30 Fight Nights come to the Paramount+ streaming service with some numbered shows to be simulcast on CBS.
The deal also ends the pay-per-view for the UFC, one that began with its inception in 1993.
From the release:
“This shift in distribution strategy will unlock greater accessibility and discoverability for sports fans and provide an important catalyst for driving engagement and further subscriber growth for Paramount+. Paramount intends to explore UFC rights outside the U.S. as they become available in the future.”
It’s a massive splash in the sports media market for new Paramount owner and Skydance Media CEO David Ellison who recently got clearance to purchase the media empire after a lengthy process.
The deal ends UFC’s run with ESPN that began nearly five years ago with a $1.5 billion total contract. That included the exclusive rights to offer UFC PPVs via their ESPN+ platform in addition to Fight Night events, The Ultimate Fighter, and access to library content. They were seen as a strong front runner given the impending launch of the ESPN streaming service and their connection to sports fans.
The release did not mention the video library or shoulder content like The Ultimate Fighter, meaning TKO could look to sell those assets elsewhere.
The news validates the desires of TKO leadership to get their $1 billion/year deal which leadershiphad floated previously. There was speculation they could split a package between entities like ESPN and Netflix.
The news comes less than a week after TKO announced WWE’s premium live events will head to ESPN as part of a five-year, $1.6 billion deal that begins in April 2026. WWE’s 10-year, $5 billion deal with Netflix began this past January and their new deals with both NBCUniversal for WWE SmackDown and NXT with The CW beginning last fall.
What remains now for TKO on the domestic front are NXT PLE rights and both UFC and WWE library/archive rights if they choose to sell them. With UFC Fight Pass, the company may just choose to keep them there.
A new report out Wednesday has Warner Bros. Discovery & Paramount discussing a corporate merger between the two entertainment entities.
Axios reported that WBD CEO David Zaslav and Paramount Global CEO Bob Bakish met Tuesday to discuss the matter over several hours that included how the two could compliment each other.
As pointed out in the article, WBD’s market cap is currently $29 billion while Paramount sits at just over $10 billion. WBD has reportedly hired bankers to evaluate a merger.
WBD has a multitude of networks and their Max streaming service while Paramount owns their own movie studio, CBS, cable networks, and their own streaming service. They also are one of several NFL rights holders while they also hold NCAA men’s basketball tournament partnership rights with WBD.
Both companies are also carrying major debt loads and are losing in the “streaming wars” to Netflix, hence why consolidation is being considered.
The news is pertinent to wrestling fans for several reasons.
WBD executive Bruce Campbell met recently with TKO’s Mark Shapiro and WWE’s Nick Khan and Paul Levesque in what was believed to be a conversation about Raw’s domestic TV rights that are up next year. The meeting came after previous attempts at talks had reportedly not gone anywhere.
It also comes as WBD’s current TV wrestling partner AEW is approaching the final year of their multi-year contract for which the future is unknown. AEW head Tony Khan said last week that he met with WBD officials on December 12th, but he didn’t delve into what the focus of the conversation was.
Regarding WWE talking with WBD, Khan said at the post-Ring of Honor Final Battle press conference that “it’s part of the TV business” and that he feels AEW has performed “incredibly well” for WBD which has led to a strong relationship. He has previously said he believes in loyalty and would like to remain on WBD’s networks.
WBD is also one of several groups discussing NBA TV rights which they are expected to share with multiple other broadcast entities. How a merger could affect those commitments of cash to the NBA, WWE or AEW is unknown.
On the Paramount side, their CBS Media Ventures syndication arm does distribute Women’s of Wrestling in a multi-year deal that began in October 2021.
