Smackdown on Fox
By Scott Keith on 22 May 2018
If you're Fox, do you want to:
a) Maintain the brand split? The pro is that you have an “exclusive” roster. The con is that you only get 40% of the roster, and history has shown that Vince treasures his Monday Night baby.
b) Be live? Audiences prefer a live show, but unless the show runs at 11 pm Eastern the west coast is always going to have a pre-taped show anyway.
c) Run the show on FS1 during programming conflicts (baseball postseason, Pac-12 championship game), run the show on another night that week (Thursday Smackdown Thursday!) or just preempt the show?
a) I think they're gonna end it so that all the big guns can be on both shows. Imagine if they paid a billion for UFC and then were told George St. Pierre will only be on shows on the other network?
b) For what they're paying, I think they'll finance the live show.
c) Probably just pre-empt it.