Monday Night Raw will begin streaming on Netflix come January 2025, but there are questions about the red brand’s home for the months before the big move.
This week, it was announced that Raw will move to Netflix as part of a $5 billion deal with the streaming giant. Fans in the U.S. will have access to Monday Night Raw each week, while those outside of the States will receive Raw, SmackDown, WWE NXT, and Premium Live Events. Netflix will not cover monthly PLEs in areas where deals are already in place with other distributors, such as India.
Monday Night Raw Without A Home
Raw’s move to Netflix won’t happen until January 2025, which has raised questions as to the red brand’s future in the final quarter of 2024. That’s because WWE’s current deal for Raw to broadcast on the USA Network will expire later this year.
On the Pollock & Thurston show, Wrestlenomics’ Brandon Thurston noted that an NBC official informed him that the USA Network will not carry Raw after the expiration date of this deal, which is September 30. On the show, Dave Meltzer of the Wrestling Observer said that an announcement was coming shortly regarding those three months in which Raw currently has no broadcast deal.
Moving to A New Day?
Raw has been synonymous with Monday nights ever since its launch, and Nick Khan intends that to be the case after the Netflix move. On the Pat McAfee show, Khan addressed the possibility of Raw being released on Netflix on a different date.
“At this moment in time, it remains Monday Night Raw. Keep in mind, we have ten and a half months until this deal is up and running… If we stay on Mondays, it’ll work, if we move to a different day, we think it’ll work too.”
In an SEC filing, it was noted that Netflix has the option to extend the WWE Raw deal beyond the initial ten years or opt out after five years.
H/T – Fightful
