The Wrestling Observer’s Bryan Alvarez states that his sources had NBC Universal offering WWE $275M for the WWE PLE package. ESPN secured WWE PLEs for the amount of $325M per year for 5 years totaling over $1.6B.
In the writeup after the information from Alvarez, there was not an indication on how many years NBCU offered or if the offer included all WWE PLEs. The report from Alvarez notes that its not clear if it was the same deal that ESPN received.
Notably, ESPN’s deal does not include the WWE video library and commitments for 5 total documentaries and 250 hours of original programming.
Alvarez noted that he WWE was “shopping around WrestleMania as a separate deal” from the PLE package.
The Wrestling Observer reports that the NBCU deal with WWE ends in March 2026 with NBCU’s contract for SmackDown and Saturday Night’s Main Event still current.”
Payout Perspective:
Interesting stuff from Alvarez as it looks like NBCU was outbid by ESPN. Nevertheless, WWE looked into splitting Wrestlemania from the other PLEs. This shows the strength of that event and the overall brand to feel as though it could command a respectable dollar amount for a two night show while selling off its PLEs elsewhere. The WWE brand is stronger than it has ever been and this is reflected in the market for its content. It is remarkable to think of the reasons how the WWE has done this but it is operating at a strength at the moment.
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