Still time to tune in to a fall classic
Ratings are way down, but Dodgers, Rays are rewarding those who are paying attention
The Los Angeles Dodgers and Tampa Bay Rays are putting on a show for the ages during this year’s World Series but, unfortunately for Major League Baseball, fewer people than ever before have been paying attention.
Ratings for baseball’s fall classic are down, way down, compared to previous years. According to Nielsen Media Research, Game 1 drew an average of 9.2 million viewers on Fox, which at the time marked the lowest rated World Series game in history. There has been a new low almost every day since.
By comparison, last year’s Game 1 between Houston and Washington drew 12.194 million. In 2018, the last time the Dodgers made it to the World Series, viewership for Game 1 was 13.76 million. This year’s numbers were worse than the previous low of 9.84 million, set by the Rays and Philadelphia in 2008 for a game that started after 10 p.m. ET because of rain.
By Game 5 of this year’s World Series, viewership dropped to 7.41 million, per Nielsen’s live and same day numbers. The ratings in Canada, which pale next to the United States, likely follow a similar downward trend but rightsholder Sportsnet has yet to release the data. The silence is telling considering there were almost daily announcements from the company touting its record viewership during Toronto’s post-season runs in 2015-16. This year, there was hardly a mention of the Jays’ wild-card games against Tampa Bay or anything that has followed.
Low television ratings are a problem that extends well beyond baseball. According to Sports Media Watch, Game 1 of this year’s NBA Finals between the Los Angeles Lakers and Miami Heat saw viewership fall by 49 per cent compared to the previous year, while the
Stanley Cup final was down by more than 60 per cent. When put side by side with those leagues, MLB’s 25 per cent drop seems like small potatoes.
Still, there are reasons for MLB to be concerned about the lack of viewers, especially during a year in which the league reportedly lost more than $3 billion because of the pandemic. Unlike hockey and basketball, MLB doesn’t have the excuse of its games taking place at an irregular time of the year. The World Series is being played in October, just like it has for decades, and there is the added benefit of having the Dodgers involved, even if their opponents are the small-market Rays.
At some point, the downward trend will have to be addressed because the problem started long before the pandemic. But, at least for now, MLB should be more focused on the things that went right during this unprecedented year. Somehow, some way, despite all the early criticism, baseball found a way to pull off a successful season in the middle of a coronavirus outbreak.
Not too many people would have predicted that back in June when the league and its players’ union were embroiled in a bitter labour dispute. Or a month later, when COVID-19 spread throughout the Miami
Marlins and St. Louis Cardinals, putting the sport’s entire schedule in jeopardy. As the first major professional sport to operate in North America this year outside a bubble, there was the chance for disaster. Instead, commissioner Rob Manfred and the rest of his staff pulled it off.
The plan wasn’t perfect, and MLB is fortunate it wasn’t hit with more positive cases, but the league and players deserve credit for making it a success. This wasn’t an easy year, and it wasn’t even a true MLB season, but everyone except the Detroit Tigers and St. Louis Cardinals managed to get their full 60-game schedule.
The payoff has been an exhilarating World Series that will remain as memorable as the bizarre season it followed: Rays rookie sensation Randy Arozarena finding his place in history by setting records for the most hits and homers in a single post-season; future Hall of Famer Clayton Kershaw shedding his reputation of being unable to perform in the playoffs with a pair of solid World Series outings; littleknown Brett Phillips becoming an overnight sensation after hitting a walk-off single in Game 4, his first plate appearance in almost three weeks.
There have been daily chess matches between Rays manager Kevin Cash and colleague Dave Roberts with the Dodgers. Two of baseball’s deepest teams, at both ends of the sport’s economic spectrum, have used almost every player on their roster to get through each game. We have seen attempted steals of home, lateinning comebacks and a slew of home runs in a ballpark where few were supposed to be hit.
This stretch of games has been baseball at its finest. The quality of play has been so good, the moments so intense, it’s barely even noticeable anymore that the games are being played in a mostly empty stadium at a neutral-site location. The atmosphere might not be quite the same as normal, but inside the dugouts and the living rooms of viewers at home, it’s as thrilling as ever.
The Dodgers have been without a World Series title since 1988, the year Kirk Gibson hit a legendary pinch-hit homer and limped around the bases pumping his fists. The Rays, who have only been around since 1998, have been here once before but have yet to come away with the title. Over the next two days, the fortunes for one of these teams will change. Those who have tuned out baseball would be wise to tune back in before it’s too late. Another dry spell for sports is right around the corner, and this is one series that is more than worth your time.