The World Poker Tour has introduced a brand new multi-year take care of CBS Sports to make the community the corporate’s unique tv companion for premiere episodes. The settlement begins this month with Season XXI motion.
“Since our debut on the Travel Channel back in 2002, our WPT television presence has grown significantly in both production quality and reach,” WPT CEO Adam Pliska stated. “We are incredibly grateful to partner with a top-tier network and cannot wait to share a wealth of premium poker programming to the vast CBS Sports audience.”
Initial episodes coming to CBS embrace the 2023 WPT Seminole Hard Rock Poker Showdown Championship. Throughout the partnership, the community will even air all episodes from Season XXII and XXIII, together with collection that includes the 2023 WPT World Championship in addition to the upcoming ClubWPT Gold $5 Million Invitational Freeroll.
The community has catered to poker gamers lately, together with including World Series of Poker and PokerGO protection in 2021. The WPT now joins that poker portfolio.
“_CBS Sports Network_ is the ideal partner to elevate WPT TV and expand its reach to new households around the nation,”, WPT Vice President of Studios, Distribution and Ad Sales Loc Sondheim stated. “It’s an honor to bring the excitement of poker to a network that showcases some of the biggest events in sports.”
Tour programming debuts CBS Sports Network on Nov. 14. Here’s a timeline of among the WPT’s tv and media protection by way of the years.
- 2002 – The tour debuts on the Travel Channel and turns into the community’s highest-rated present on the time. The community aired the tour’s first 5 seasons.
- 2004 – A WPT particular “Battle of Champions” event airs on NBC reverse CBS’s protection of the Super Bowl pregame present.
- 2006 The WPT airs on Game Show Network (GSN) for one season.
- 2008 – The tour indicators a take care of Fox Sports Net (FSN) to air 26 episode of the tv present.
- 2009 – After the corporate is acquired by PartyGaming, episodes start airing in Europe making use of the Social gatheringPoker model.
- 2014 – The firm launches the WPT Alpha8 excessive curler collection, which is proven on Fox Sports 1.
- 2015 – Free streaming service Pluto TV provides a 24/7 WPT channel. The tour additionally streams reside closing tables from varied occasions as nicely on YouTube.
- 2016 – The tour once more indicators a five-year take care of Fox Sports regional networks (later to be generally known as Bally Sports).
- 2019 – A brand new deal is introduced with BT Sport to point out tour occasions within the United Kingdom and Ireland.
- 2019 – Another worldwide deal is introduced with TV Azteca to convey the tour to a Spanish language viewers in Mexico and different Latin American nations.
- 2019 – The WatchWPT app is unveiled, permitting poker followers to view an archive of 150-plus episodes.
- 2021 – A brand new deal is struck with Samsung TV Plus for the present to succeed in viewers in United Kingdom, Sweden, Netherlands, Spain, France, Italy, Germany, Austria, and Switzerland.
- 2024 – An new settlement is introduced with CBS Sports Network within the U.S.
