Friday Night SmackDown Leaving Fox, Returning to USA Network in 2024

[TMC]

https://tvline.com/news/wwe-friday-n...24-1235046738/

BY RYAN SCHWARTZ

SEPTEMBER 21, 2023 6:00 AM

Friday Night SmackDown is headed back to basic cable.

Following a five-year stint at Fox, SmackDown will return to USA Network in October 2024. As part of a newly struck deal with NBCUniversal, WWE will also produce four annual specials for NBC, marking the first time WWE content will air as part of NBC’s primetime slate.

“NBCUniversal has been a tremendous partner of WWE for decades,” WWE President Nick Khan said in a statement Thursday. “We are excited to extend this longstanding relationship by bringing SmackDown to USA Network on Friday nights and look forward to debuting multiple WWE special events annually on NBC.”

Added NBCUniversal Entertainment Chairman Frances Berwick: “It’s a privilege and thrill to continue NBCU’s decades-long partnership with WWE, which has helped cement USA Network’s consistent position as the top-rated cable entertainment network in live viewership. With Friday nights on USA, primetime specials on NBC, and the WWE hub on Peacock, we’ll continue to use the power of our portfolio to super- serve this passionate fanbase.”

USA Network is currently home to WWE Monday Night RAW and Tuesday night’s WWE NXT, which will continue to air on USA through September 2024. SmackDown has aired on several networks since its inception in 1999, including UPN (1999-2006), The CW (2006-2008), MyNetwork (2008-2010), Syfy (2010-2016), USA Network (2016-2019) and, most recently, Fox (2019—), where it will continue to be shown through September 2024.

[Hawkee]

In popular sports whether it's baseball basketball hockey auto racing or tennis they always seem to have exclusive rights to a certain network whether if it's streaming channels or a TV network. With WWE it is one of those hard sports that finds it difficult to stay on a popular network. Why I think WWE Friday Night Smackdown is leaving FOX is probably due to their contract with FOX expiring and possibly low ratings and when you get the general picture USA Network should be known as "The Official Home Of WWE" because it seems that when USA Network has WWE wrestling it usually brings big ratings for them. Because I think the main reason why Friday Night Smackdown went to FOX is so FOX could add sports to their Friday lineup which is usually reserved for sitcoms and other shows that FOX offers. Also since NBC and USA are owned by Universal WWE probably gets a bigger salary and they thought moving back to USA was a good idea. Because USA already airs some WWE wrestling such as Monday Night Raw and they already have a deal with Peacock and their WWE section this might work out well