The thrilling extended clash that saw the Dodgers beat the Toronto Blue Jays by one run averaged a total 51M spectators across the United States, Canada, and Japanese markets. Major League Baseball stated this is the highest-rated Fall Classic Game 7 since the 1991 contest between the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Television Ratings Breakdown
The Saturday epic contest secured over 27 million audience members on Fox Sports networks, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s digital services. According to Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated broadcast of the previous week.
It additionally is the most-watched Fall Classic matchup after the 2017 Game 7 between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Astros, which averaged over 29 million. This marks a sixteen percent improvement over the previous Game 7 between the Nationals and Houston Astros, which attracted 23.19 million.
In the Nielsen ratings, the sixth game placed fourth, Game 4 ranked 7th, the fifth game came in 8th, and the third game landed in 13th position.
International Viewership Figures
In the Canadian market, the climactic game averaged 11.6 million watchers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports. This was the highest-rated English-language program in Canada since the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the deciding contest began at 9 PM local time, it attracted 12M. This followed the previous Friday’s Game 6 – in which Fall Classic MVP Yamamoto allowed a single run in six frames – drew 13.1M spectators, making it the highest-rated Fall Classic game on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Series Totals and Trends
The full seven-game series drew over 15.7 million audience members on the Fox network, a 2% increase from the previous year’s Dodgers versus Yankees matchup. This marks the initial instance after 2015 and ‘16 that the Fall Classic has recorded audience growth for two consecutive seasons.
Counting the opening game telecast on the Univision network, the total American viewership reached 16.1 million. The overall Fall Classic viewership in the Japanese market was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The complete playoffs on Fox and its sister channels drew 8.09M viewers, an 8% rise compared to the previous year and Fox’s strongest postseason ratings after the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball stated that the World Series was broadcast in over 200 countries and territories by forty-four media partners in 16 various languages.
