Why no NWA / WCW or ECW TV in Puerto Rico?

[TVCOOL]

Why no local TV station in Puerto Rico never picked up WCW Worldwide and/or Pro or ECW Hardcore TV to air.

 

[davideduardo]

Why no local TV station in Puerto Rico never picked up WCW Worldwide and/or Pro or ECW Hardcore TV to air.

There could be a variety of reasons:

1. the distribution satellite does not have a good footprint over PR.
2. The costs are too high in a highly depressed local TV market.
3. Nobody thinks there is enough interest in wrestling on the Island.

As to the third point, in the 20-some years I either lived in PR or programmed stations there, I can't recall seeing any significant interest in wrestling. Never got an ad buy for a wrestling event, and never saw any widely promoted.

 

[purpledevil]

There could be a variety of reasons:

1. the distribution satellite does not have a good footprint over PR.
2. The costs are too high in a highly depressed local TV market.
3. Nobody thinks there is enough interest in wrestling on the Island.

As to the third point, in the 20-some years I either lived in PR or programmed stations there, I can't recall seeing any significant interest in wrestling. Never got an ad buy for a wrestling event, and never saw any widely promoted.

Carlos Colon would disagree. The Puerto Rican territory has long been associated with the Colon family and his World Wrestling Council. Much of the reason no one else even made much of an attempt at show promotion on the island. The Colons have historically owned pro wrestling in Puerto Rico.

 

[CTListener]

Carlos Colon would disagree. The Puerto Rican territory has long been associated with the Colon family and his World Wrestling Council. Much of the reason no one else even made much of an attempt at show promotion on the island. The Colons have historically owned pro wrestling in Puerto Rico.

And there was also a tacit agreement with the WWWF/WWF to stay out. I believe Gorilla Monsoon, who owned a stake in the WWWF/WWF, was also part of Colon's group in Puerto Rico. The absence of other wrestling on Puerto Rican TV may have been due not to lack of interest, but to the knowledge by other promoters that, with the cartel-like arrangement Colon and McMahon had in place, they'd face significant resistance if they tried to promote a live card on the island.

 

[TVCOOL]

But WCW could've tried to get TV time on a local station for Worldwide at least when the wrestling boom in the 1990s.

 

[davideduardo]

Carlos Colon would disagree. The Puerto Rican territory has long been associated with the Colon family and his World Wrestling Council. Much of the reason no one else even made much of an attempt at show promotion on the island. The Colons have historically owned pro wrestling in Puerto Rico.

And they never promoted it well. I was with the #1 18-49 male station Island-wide almost all the years from 1978 to 2005, and we never had any pro wrestling buys.

Whatever activity there was was pretty well hidden because most events took place in smaller rural towns and not in the major cities. TV was mostly on secondary channels, with recorded events on Sunday morning; the ratings declined and the shows gradually were cut.

 

[davideduardo]

But WCW could've tried to get TV time on a local station for Worldwide at least when the wrestling boom in the 1990s.

There were shows, but the ratings gradually shrunk and they were always placed in bad Sunday time periods.

Local wrestling could be done in Spanish, but any mainland events had the disadvantage of being in English. PR is far less bilingual than most folks think.