As previously noted, FOX had a meeting on Tuesday night about their fall schedule and WWE was talked about at the meeting.
Dave Meltzer noted in the Wrestling Observer Newsletter that the plan is for SmackDown Live to air 51 weeks on FOX and the show will be preempted once in October because of the World Series. My guess is that they would just move the show to Fox Sports 1 on the week that they are preempted.
Meltzer also noted that FOX will be doing a one-hour launch show in September to introduce WWE and its talent to the FOX audience.
It sounds like FOX is all in with WWE because, as previously noted, there are plans to make the first broadcast into a major event with celebrities. This is why the first show was booked for the STAPLES Center in Los Angeles.
Also, as previously noted, there are talks going on for Fox Sports to pick up the NXT show that currently airs on the WWE Network. If a deal can be reached then Fox Sports (likely Fox Sports 1) would air the NXT show against AEW’s weekly show in a head-to-head battle.
AEW has not announced what night of the week the show will air but at the Fight For The Fallen post-show press conference, Tony Khan said that the show will not compete with the NFL. All signs point towards Tuesday or Wednesday night and it will be a 2-hour show from 8 to 10 pm. Wednesday night seems the most likely night at this point because it keeps them away from NBA preemptions and they recently filed for the “Wednesday Night Dynamite” trademark.
WWE will also run a studio show on Tuesday night so either way, AEW will be up against WWE programming.
You can hear Khan talk about AEW on TNT in the video below from the Fight For The Fallen media scrum:
