The exciting extended contest where the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the Blue Jays by one run averaged a aggregate 51 million spectators across the United States, Canadian, and Japan markets. Major League Baseball stated this marks the highest-rated World Series Game 7 after the 1991 edition showdown featuring the Minnesota Twins and Atlanta Braves.
Television Ratings Details
Last Saturday’s epic contest drew 27.33 million viewers on Fox Sports channels, Fox Deportes and their digital services. According to Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated program of the previous week.
It additionally is the top-rated World Series matchup after the 2017 Game 7 between the Dodgers and Houston Astros, which averaged 29.07M. This marks a sixteen percent increase over the previous finale between the Nationals and Houston Astros, which drew 23.19 million.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 placed fourth, the fourth game was 7th, Game 5 came in 8th, and Game 3 landed in thirteenth position.
Global Viewership Numbers
In Canada, the game recorded 11.6M viewers on Sportsnet and the French TVA Sports. This made it the highest-rated English-language broadcast in the country since the 2010 edition Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the final contest began at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it averaged 12 million. This followed last Friday’s sixth game – in which Fall Classic MVP Yamamoto gave up a single run in six frames – averaged over 13 million viewers, making it the most-watched Fall Classic matchup on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Overall Averages and Trends
The entire seven-game series drew over 15.7 million audience members on the Fox network, a 2% rise from last year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This represents the first time after 2015 and 2016 that the World Series has seen audience increases for two consecutive seasons.
Counting the Game 1 telecast on Univision, the complete American average was 16.1M. The overall Fall Classic viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1M in Canada.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox, FS1 and FS2 drew over 8 million watchers, an 8% increase compared to last year and Fox’s strongest playoff ratings after the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball reported that the Fall Classic was televised in over 200 countries and territories by 44 broadcasting partners in sixteen various tongues.
