News On AEW's Television Format, Live Event Scheduling Plans

With AEW's debut on TNT now revealed as Wednesday, October 2nd, we're starting to learn more about [...]

By Ryan Droste

With AEW's debut on TNT now revealed as Wednesday, October 2nd, we're starting to learn more about what the company's television and live events will look like.

The first edition of AEW on TNT will be broadcast from the Capital One Arena in Washington D.C. According to a report from this week's Wrestling Observer Newsletter, the company will typically look at booking venues that seat between 6,000 and 11,000 fans, depending on the market and demand. The Capital One Arena is quite a bit larger than that, seating 20,000 for basketball games.

It was noted that television events will be similar to WWE in that AEW will have matches for the live crowd prior to going live on TNT at 8:00 p.m. Eastern in order to warm the crowd up.

One would think that demand for AEW's first live television event would be high, and the Capital One Arena in D.C. will be by far the largest venue the promotion has run to this point. Some of the capacity for the AEW show will depend on how they set-up the venue with the entrance ramp and whether or not they try to sell the entire venue, but the Capital One Arena is capable of seating several thousand more fans than the Sears Centre in Hoffman Estates, Illinois where the All Out PPV will occur next month.

The Sears Centre is significantly smaller than the Allstate Arena and United Center in Chicago, which would be more comparable arenas to Capital One Arena in D.C., so it will be interesting to see if AEW expands into a larger venue the next time they run the Chicago market.

In regards to the live touring schedule, the Observer notes that AEW is planning on running 100-120 live shows per year, including television every Wednesday night and around four PPV events yearly. The plan is to run a Saturday night house show during most weeks, with some weeks expanded to more than one house show. On average, wrestlers will be working about 75 matches per yet, far less than their WWE counterparts with the idea that this will keep performers healthier and more capable of putting on the athletic matches they are expecting on a consistent basis.

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