Tag: TV deals

MLW signs with ICM Partners, looks for new TV deal this spring

Posted on by Josh Nason

Deadline.com reported Tuesday that Court Bauer’s Major League Wrestling has signed a deal with major Hollywood agency ICM Partners as they look to sign a new TV and streaming deal.

MLW Fusion launched on beIN Sports in April 2018 where the network currently has a reach of 23 million U.S. homes with broadcasts in English and Spanish. Fusion is also available on YouTube several days after first airing on beIN.

From Deadline: “The league showed growth of over 43% in total viewers from 2018 to 2019, and their weekly hourlong Fusion series reaches over 2.5 million viewers on beIN Sports.” 

The article said that MLW is looking to take advantage of the recent upswing in live sports TV rights deals, especially in pro wrestling. Bauer was quoted as saying MLW is in an unique position, given they are the only wrestling free agent property available in 2020.

The ICM deal also includes representation for MLW Studios, “a multi-platform media studio focusing on original scripted and non-scripted programming.” 

Report: XFL working on deals with Fox and ABC

Posted on by Josh Nason

John Ourand of the Sports Business Journal reported Tuesday that Vince McMahon’s revival of the XFL may find itself on not one, but two networks come its 2020 debut.

In the article (subscription needed), Ourand said that the league is “deep” in discussions with both Fox and ESPN that would bring two thirds of the league’s games to ABC, Fox, ESPN, and FS1. He added that ESPN+ isn’t on the table as of this point.

McMahon’s WWE will begin their run on Fox with SmackDown beginning there this September.

In last week’s Wrestling Observer Newsletter, Dave Meltzer said the XFL expects to announce broadcast deals in the next few weeks and that they want to have their eight “star quarterbacks” and head coaches in place by March so they can begin promoting in each of the league’s markets 10 months in advance.

The XFL’s main competition — the American Alliance of Football — begins play a week after the Super Bowl.

Report: ONE Championship, Turner Sports to sign three-year deal

Posted on by Josh Nason

This story was updated at 3 PM Eastern.

The most active and financially lucrative year in combat sports TV content history continued Tuesday with the news that ONE Championship, formerly ONE Fighting Championship, is coming to U.S. based Turner Sports, according to ESPN”s Ariel Helwani.

Asian-based ONE is the MMA organization that recently “traded” for former UFC flyweight champion Demetrious Johnson and signed both former UFC lightweight champion Eddie Alvarez and UFC welterweight prospect Sage Northcutt. 

Since we originally posted this story, clarifications have been made and there’s some clarity still needed as to the finer details.

The deal is for three years and begins on January 19th, 2019, with 24 shows per year to air live on B/R Live, Turner’s paid digital platform which made headlines this year for offering NBA fans the chance to buy single games or even part of a single game. It’s not known if they will do a season pass, pay per fight basis, or just pay per show.

Helwani wrote that taped events will air on TNT with “shoulder” programming and a reality show also in the plans. However, it’s unclear how many shows that will be, whether they just be ‘best of’ shows, or airtimes.

Financial details weren’t disclosed as the organization has yet to publicly comment as of this writing. It’s expected something will be formally announced in the next few days.

Turner Sports was interested in acquring the UFC broadcast rights earlier this year, but the company’s merger talks with AT&T prevented that from going further. 

So far in 2019, the industry has seen the UFC sign a five year, $1.5 billion deal with ESPN, WWE sign deals with NBCUniversal and Fox totaling $2.35 billion, and DAZN sign both Bellator and boxer Canelo Alvarez to big money deals.