WWE: Could There Be A New Way to Watch Pay-Per-Views?

When it came to streaming services, Netflix and Hulu were the only two in town. As those gained popularity, we would start seeing more streaming services. On February 24th, the WWE would launch its own streaming service called the WWE Network. The purpose of this was to be a cheaper way to watch pay per view at a reasonable price. You can also watch original content, older material, and anything else that the WWE has done. Since it’s inception, it’s been 9.99 for a month. The PPV was included in that monthly price.

However, it seems that the WWE may be pulling the PPV’s off the Network. According to Dave Meltzer of the Wrestling Observer Radio, WWE is interested in selling their pay-per-view rights. It seems that ESPN’s streaming service is the one that they would like to sell it to. According to Meltzer, this is because how much ESPN paid the UFC to air their pay-per-views. When the ESPN/UFC deal happened, it was reportedly over $700 million dollar deal. This is not what you want to do to a fanbase that has a short fuse. WWE would be facing many problems by going this route.

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For starters, they would lead people to stream the events illegally. In the timeframe that the WWE Network has been around, fans have only been paying 9.99 a month. By going to ESPN, The monthly subscription is cheaper than the WWE Network at only $4.99 a month. However, the price for the PPV would be $60. That’s the price they charge for the UFC shows.

Another problem they would face is that they would lose subscribers to the Network very fast. Most of the other stuff that’s on the Network can also be seen on Youtube. However, WWE would face a major problem. One of the bigger events that are done on the Network is Takeover. As of this writing, we don’t know if the Takeovers would make the move to the ESPN Plus app.

In my opinion, I would keep the Network for the NXT material. If NXT is apart of the move, then I will cancel my subscription. The problem now is that a lot of the main roster PPVs are not good and I’m not going to shell out $60 dollars for each one. I know there have been people who are making the comparison to AEW who charged $50 per PPV, but there’s a major difference. The six AEW events that they have put on have been worth the money. I don’t remember a WWE PPV that’s worth $60.

With this move, WWE fans would be shelling out $720 dollars for a PPV. Right now WWE fans shell out 119.88 for all the PPVs and everything else.