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The reality is that even in the shitty chaotic state its in WBD, is *still* in a better position than AEW and has the leverage over the wrestling company.
There is no non-WWE-affiliated American TV provider bigger than WBD that's interested in any kind of pro wrestling. "Based Lachlan" is done with wrestling period. The Fox network schedule is already booked for the season, there's no room for wrestling. Wrestling has been replaced with college football and will get better ratings. FS1 will be a *demotion*
Paramount is in worse shape than WBD. Amazon doesn't want them and is putting its money into trying to acquire the big 4. And that's the landscape.
WBD has the leverage on the offer. And AEW is down year over year. In *every* metric that matters: ratings, live attendance.
Except PPV buyrates, but the only source according to that is Tony Khan himself, and we're apparently not supposed to think its odd that WBD let go of their Bleacher Report exclusivity for PPVs and let AEW take them to the open market for several months now.
The odds that AEW could find a better offer on the open market are unlikely and if they sign with WBD *after* the exclusivity window ended, it proves there were no better counter-offers.
WBD has no reason to put down a lot more money for AEW. Maybe a little courtesy bump for the tenure. But they can push AEW into whatever shape they think works best for them: maybe its 3 hour dynamites, maybe its a demotion to TruTV, maybe ppvs go on max and there's more reality tv slop
