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Major League Wrestling announced this evening that they will debut this Spring on ViceTV, the home of The Dark Side of the Ring.
PWInsider.com has learned that the debut will be in May and initially, MLW will feature content from their library timed to take advantage of Dark Side’s new season. The strategy behind that is to help ViceTV viewers learn about the company’s top stars, stories and history and that by using archival content, they prevent their first impression from being empty arena content.
Dark Side season three kicks off with a Brian Pillman-themed episode on Thursday May 6th, so one would think that is when MLW pops up on the cable network. It’s expected that MLW will be the lead-in for the pro wrestling documentary series.
If everything works out as planned, PWInsider.com is told MLW will return to taping TV in front of fans this July. That material would then begin airing as soon as possible on ViceTV. The belief the shows would be taped and not broadcast live, but MLW has done live TV in the past on BeIn Sport and could easily stage that again if necessary.
Since MLW’s announcement tonight was their ViceTV deal, it’s possible that Court Bauer’s announcement on this week’s Fusion episode is the return of live events, but we don’t have that confirmed. MLW has dates in Philadelphia, Dallas and Chicago that have been postponed several times over the course of the COVID-19 pandemic. The promotion had been taping in Florida in recent months for Fusion.
The ViceTV deal is not replacing the current deals with DAZN and BeIn Sport, PWInsider.com is told, In fact, the opposite is the case as Court Bauer is seeking to get MLW on as many broadcast and streaming platforms as possible with the idea of creating unique programming across the board when needed for as many deals as they can lock in. The mindset is that before, you wanted to be in one place but today, you want to entrench yourself in as many places as possible to maximize revenue and allow for different choices for fans to consume the content. If they can lock in five deals and need to create content for all five of those deals, that will be their priority.
As PWInsider.com reported last week, there have been recent discussions with Discovery and we are told those talks are still in progress. There may be other outlets as well still on the horizon.
This Wednesday’s MLW Fusion is slated to feature Bu Ku Dao vs. TJP, Bauer making an appearance and an Alexander Hammerstone press conference. For more, visit www.MLW.com.
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