The CW is set to become the exclusive home for NASCAR’s Xfinity Series

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https://awfulannouncing.com/the-cw/n...ve-rights.html

The CW continues to add more live sports.

By Sam Neumann on 07/28/2023

In a surprising twist, NASCAR’s Xfinity Series has landed with The CW.

The news was first reported by Sports Business Journal on Friday, with NASCAR later confirming that The CW would be the exclusive home for the Xfinity Series race starting in 2025. The deal runs through 2031 and according to SBJ, The CW will pay $115 million per year for the rights while carrying 33 Xfinity Series races per year, in addition to practices and qualifying events.

For the first time in series history, every NASCAR Xfinity Series race will be available on free, over-the-air broadcast television. Additional content will also be made available through The CW’s digital platforms. NASCAR Productions will produce the races, in coordination with The CW, who will be responsible for bringing in the on-air talent.

Here’s what Dennis Miller, President of The CW, and Brian Herbst, Senior Vice President, Media and Productions for NASCAR, had to say about the agreed-upon deal:

Herbst said: “CW’s leadership shared a compelling vision for cultivating the next generation of NASCAR talent by bringing the NASCAR Xfinity Series exclusively to broadcast television and we are thrilled for the opportunity to partner with them. With more than 1 million viewers tuning in each week to see NASCAR’s future stars battle some of its biggest names at our most legendary tracks, the NASCAR Xfinity Series consistently delivers the moments that excite current fans and create new fans of our great sport.”

The NASCAR Xfinity Races include some of the sport’s most iconic tracks, like the Daytona International Speedway, Talladega Superspeedway and the series championship at Phoenix Raceway.

This is just another instance of The CW throwing its hat into the live sports ring. Earlier this month, it was announced that 50 Raycom-produced ACC basketball and football games dropped by Diamond Sports had landed with the television network. The CW’s deal for the games runs through the 2026-27 season and includes 13 football games, 28 men’s basketball games and nine women’s basketball games.

According to SBJ, The CW will have live sports programming 48 weekends each year starting in 2025.

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When it comes to racing no matter if it's Indy Car Racing or any type of racing the networks and cable stations have always gotten into a huge battle about who gets the rights to show the races and the top networks always win and end up getting the exclusive rights to show the races. With The CW getting the rights to show NASCAR"s Xfinity Series races I think The CW wants to have all the NASCAR races and they think it will bring big ratings to The CW and hope to add more NASCAR races in the future. Because a similar thing happened with ABC when ABC became the official home of the Indy Car Racing division CART races the races brought in huge ratings for ABC but when ABC ended their contract with CART some of the races moved from ABC to Spike TV and ESPN and it had cost CART poor ratings in it's racing viewership. NASCAR races were a staple on CBS but once CBS no longer showed NASCAR racing they switched to FOX and FX ran NASCAR for a short while. But I can see why NASCAR chose The CW for it's Xfinity Series races because they hoped it would bring more fans to NASCAR and The CW gave them a huge money contract. I just hope The CW doesn't get the rights to the Daytona 500 next?