Last year, Netflix announced it had secured one of the biggest shows in sports entertainment.
The streaming platform revealed that it landed a $5 billion 10-year deal with WWE (TKO) , making Netflix the new home of WWE’s “Monday Night Raw,” starting in January 2025. The move comes after the show spent three decades on USA Network, making it the longest-running weekly episodic series on television.
🎁 Buy 1 Year and Get 1 Year FREE on TheStreet Pro. Act now before it’s gone ⏰
“By combining our reach, recommendations, and fandom with WWE, we’ll be able to deliver more joy and value for their audiences and our members,” said Netflix Chief Content Officer Bela Bajaria in a press release last year.
Related: Netflix’s Mike Tyson vs. Jake Paul fight raises major red flag
WWE Raw is set to finally debut on the streaming platform tonight (Jan. 6) at 8 p.m. EST / 7 p.m. CST with a lineup that includes wrestlers John Cena, Cody Rhodes and Roman Reigns.
Triple H confirms major change to WWE Raw ahead of Netflix debut
Ahead of the live event, WWE Chief Content Officer Paul Michael Levesque, better known as Triple H, confirmed that the Netflix deal will bring a major change to the show.
In a new interview on the “SI Media With Jimmy Traina” podcast, Triple H confirmed that WWE Raw will have a “flexible” runtime going forward after recently airing as a two-hour show on USA Network.
Triple H makes an appearance during Monday Night RAW at the Bell Centre on April 15, 2024 in Montreal, Canada.
“It’ll be flexible in that I don’t think necessarily the time constraints of network television or cable television apply,” said Triple H. “It’s a slightly different form, it’s a slightly different platform.”
He stated that, similar to drama episodic shows, each WWE Raw episode will be able to run for as long as it needs to on the platform.
“If this episode needs to be an hour, great, it’s an hour,” said Triple H. “If this next episode needs to be 42 minutes, it’s 42 minutes. It’s what makes for the best product. Now I’m not saying that we’re going to be 42 minutes a week, but clearly we’ll deliver the product in a way that is best for Netflix and for their business model and and what is best for our storytelling.”
Related: A top WWE exec resigns after being named in Vince McMahon’s lawsuit
Triple H revealed that he views the perfect show runtime for WWE Raw to be around 2 ½ hours since three hours can sometimes “feel long” and two hours is sometimes “not enough.”
“Sometimes you get into the two-hour show and you just don’t have the real estate on that program to get everything in there you want to get in, and all the stories that you want to get in, and all the characters that you want to get in, and there are people that are getting left off,” said Triple H.
When WWE Raw first debuted in 1993, each live episode was an hour long. Then, in 1997, it became a two-hour show, and by 2012, the runtime was extended to three hours. Just last year in October, the show went back to running for two hours.
So, a flexible episode runtime will be a first in WWE Raw history.
Netflix’s live TV ambitions face concerns ahead of WWE Raw debut
The highly anticipated debut of WWE Raw on Netflix comes after the streaming platform faced backlash from its members for botching the viral Jake Paul vs. Mike Tyson boxing match in November last year.
Many viewers took to social media to complain that the match suffered significant buffering issues, making it difficult to watch the fight live.
More Sports Media:
NBA could secure nearly $7 billion in deal with ESPN, Amazon, and NBCWhat the Netflix and WWE deal means for the future of the media industryESPN’s Jason Kelce signing showcases Disney’s new strategy, per Dan Le Batard
This sparked concern about Netflix’s ability to host other live events, such as NFL games and WWE Raw, on its platform.
During an earnings call in October last year, Netflix Co-CEO Theodore Sarandos said that the company has high hopes that its future endeavors in live streaming will help boost engagement on the platform.
“We’re really excited that we’re going to be capturing even more of the excitement that comes when the whole world gets together to watch something, and that’s (a) really fun part of live,” said Sarandos. “The contributor to growing engagement is going to be across the board on our scripted and unscripted or documentary programming, all the kind of things that people love, including now the addition of some live hours.”
Related: Veteran fund manager issues dire S&P 500 warning for 2025
