The nail-biting extended clash that saw the Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Blue Jays by one run averaged a total over 50 million spectators across the US, Canada, and Japan markets. Major League Baseball announced this marks the most-watched Fall Classic Game 7 since the 1991 edition showdown featuring the Minnesota Twins and Braves.
Television Viewership Details
The Saturday memorable contest drew over 27 million audience members on Fox Sports channels, its Spanish-language channel and Fox’s streaming platforms. According to Nielsen, it was the second highest-rated program of the week.
It also is the most-watched Fall Classic matchup after the 2017 final game between the Dodgers and Astros, which averaged 29.07 million. This represents a 16% increase over the last Game 7 featuring the Nationals and Astros, which drew 23.19M.
In the Nielsen ratings, Game 6 placed 4th, Game 4 ranked 7th, the fifth game was 8th, and the third game landed in thirteenth position.
Global Viewership Figures
In the Canadian market, the climactic game recorded 11.6 million viewers on the Sportsnet network and the French-language TVA Sports. This was the highest-rated English-language broadcast in the country after the 2010 edition Winter Olympics.
In the Japanese market, where the final contest started at 9 PM local time, it drew 12 million. This followed last Friday’s Game 6 – in which World Series Most Valuable Player Yoshinobu Yamamoto gave up one run in six innings – drew 13.1M spectators, making it the most-watched World Series matchup on a sole broadcaster in the country.
Overall Averages and Patterns
The entire seven-match World Series drew 15.71 million audience members on Fox, a 2% increase from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees series. This represents the initial instance after 2015 and ‘16 that the Fall Classic has seen audience increases for two consecutive seasons.
Including the opening game telecast on the Univision network, the complete US average reached over 16 million. The total Fall Classic average in Japan was 9.7 million and 8.1 million in the Canadian market.
The complete MLB Postseason on Fox and its sister channels drew 8.09M watchers, an 8% increase compared to last year and the network’s strongest playoff ratings since the 2017 season.
Major League Baseball stated that the World Series was broadcast in over 200 countries and territories by 44 broadcasting partners in 16 various languages.
