News broke this week that the WWE was in talks with Ring Of Honor Wrestling but the rumors soon swirled out of control. Many people assumed that the WWE was trying to buy Ring of Honor Wrestling from the Sinclair Broadcast Group but that ended up being false speculation. What it turned out to be about is that the WWE is looking at licensing ROH material.
What could this mean for Ring of Honor?
This could actually be huge news for Ring of Honor. The idea is that the WWE is looking for more material for the WWE Network and if they included the ROH TV show, it could open up brand new doors for the company.
The problem with this is that Sinclair is a broadcast group and they air ROH on their networks. However, not everyone gets a Sinclair channel where they live, which limits the number of people who can see the product. If Ring of Honor possibly added their TV shows to the WWE Network as replays, where they would then end up available to watch at any time, anyone around the world could watch ROH with a WWE Network subscription. This is supposed to be similar to the deals that the WWE offered PROGRESS Wrestling and Insane Championship Wrestling in the U.K. There is also a chance that the WWE could make a similar offer to EVOLVE since they already share a working relationship with the company.
What could this mean for ROH fans?
As already mentioned, if the WWE licenses the Ring of Honor television show to air, it would mean that many more people will be able to see the product. People in cities or states that don't carry Sinclair Broadcast networks can finally see ROH for the first time. However, there is more to it than that.
If the deal was good enough, the WWE could offer to host past major ROH shows as well and fans can go back and relive the glory days of ROH when names like AJ Styles, Samoa Joe, Daniel Bryan, CM Punk, Kevin Owens, Sami Zayn, Seth Rollins, and more wrestled there. It would also open up the rights for the WWE to use Ring of Honor footage on upcoming DVDs, such as the Kevin Owens and Seth Rollins' sets that are coming out.
