WWE’s new multi-year content partnership with Bleacher Report is drawing criticism, from a wrestling journalist who objects to the timing after PAC’s death and from boxing promoter Lou DiBella, who argues that deals like it threaten independent coverage.
WWE and Bleacher Report announced the deal on Monday. Bleacher Report, which Warner Bros. Discovery owns through TNT Sports, gets global highlight rights to Raw, SmackDown, NXT and premium live events such as WrestleMania. The content will run across Bleacher Report, House of Highlights and B/R Wrestling, and coverage begins ahead of Money in the Bank on October 10. Here is our full breakdown of the deal.
Ben Allison of Wrestling Republic wrote on X that WWE announcing a new media deal “before even acknowledging the passing of PAC is everything that’s currently wrong with the company in my eyes.” Allison said the company once would “quickly pay tribute to a wrestler” even if that wrestler worked for another promotion, and that he fears that since the TKO merger it takes “a significant amount of bureaucracy” before WWE can acknowledge the death of someone from outside the company. He expects a tribute to come, but called the wait unfortunate.
AEW announced Sunday night that Benjamin Satterley, who wrestled as PAC and spent years in WWE as Neville, died at 40, a day after he challenged Andrade El Idolo for the AEW National Championship at All Out. Triple H posted a tribute on X on Monday, calling Satterley a major force in the early days of NXT, and WWE stars including Rhea Ripley and Paul Heyman also paid their respects. An official WWE company statement had not been reported at the time of writing.
DiBella broadened the complaint. “So that’s what they call journalistic ‘pay for play’ now … content partnerships,” he wrote, predicting the same in UFC and Zuffa Boxing. WWE and UFC are both TKO properties, and TKO is the managing partner of Zuffa Boxing. DiBella conceded such deals will appear “all over the multi-billion dollar businesses of sports,” but argued they create “a mutual dependency that destroys freedom and investigative journalism.”
The announcement doesn’t include financial terms. It describes highlight rights, plus B/R and House of Highlights content teams working ringside at select premium live events. Bleacher Report already partners with the NFL, NCAA, MLB, NHL and NBA. A WBD spokesperson told F4WOnline that B/R sits in TNT Sports, a separate division, and that WBD’s “significant” relationship with AEW covers the U.S. only while the WWE deal is global. “One doesn’t replace or diminish the other,” WBD said.
AEW’s rights deal with WBD runs through 2027, with a WBD option for 2028, and Tony Khan has said he welcomes Paramount’s pending takeover of WBD.
