WWE's commercial expectations in the streaming field could be facing a clash with reality. Although the company has closed key agreements with platforms such as Netflix and maintains its society with Peacock, the first data would not be supporting projected growth or returns that were expected in terms of audience and economic impact.
During his speech at the last edition of Wrestling Observer Radio, Dave Meltzer He expressed doubts about WWE's media rights strategy, especially given the increases that the company – and also UFC – are looking for. Both companies aspire to increases close to the 70% in their next contracts, but platforms like Peacock may not be able to assume that cost.
“Peacock was already losing money and still overcame Wwe over their possibilities, “ Meltzer commented. “And now they want 70% more. That simply makes no economic sense. “
The journalist also pointed to the performance of WWE Backlash In Netflix as an alarm signal. Despite being one of WWE's first events on the platform, the data indicates that He failed to capture new audience outside the already faithful nucleus a RAW y SmackDown.
“I saw the backlash numbers in Netflix and it seems that nobody saw it beyond those who are still weekly Raw“, he said.” On a subscriber -based platform, if they are already inside, you are not generating anything new. “He even criticized the value of RAW within the new agreement: “Paying 500 million dollars a year for RAW makes no sense with what it really produces“.
All this raises a complex scenario for WWE. If you fail to expand your fans base through streaming, justify these contracts will become increasingly difficult. Although events like WrestleMania They can offer greater return, the current perception is that The rest of the content is not yielding to the level expected by platforms such as Netflix.
