The exciting 11-inning clash where the Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Blue Jays 5-4 averaged a combined 51 million viewers across the US, Canada, and Japan territories. Major League Baseball stated this is the highest-rated Fall Classic finale after the 1991 contest between the Twins and Braves.
Television Ratings Details
The Saturday epic contest drew 27.33 million audience members on Fox Sports channels, its Spanish-language channel and their digital services. Per ratings data, it was the second highest-rated program of the previous week.
It also is the top-rated World Series game after the 2017 edition final game involving the Dodgers and Astros, which averaged 29.07M. This represents a sixteen percent improvement over the last Game 7 featuring the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, which drew 23.19M.
In the Nielsen ratings, the sixth game placed 4th, the fourth game ranked seventh, Game 5 was eighth, and the third game landed in thirteenth place.
International Audience Numbers
In the Canadian market, the climactic game recorded 11.6M watchers on Sportsnet and the French-language TVA Sports channel. This was the most-watched English program in Canada after the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In Japan, where the final game began at 9 p.m. in the local time zone, it attracted 12M. This followed last Friday’s Game 6 – in which World Series MVP Yamamoto gave up a single run in six innings – recorded 13.1 million viewers, making it the most-watched Fall Classic game on a sole broadcaster in Japan.
Series Totals and Patterns
The full seven-game series drew over 15.7 million viewers on the Fox network, a two percent increase from the previous year’s Dodgers-Yankees matchup. This represents the first time after 2015 and 2016 that the Fall Classic has recorded audience growth for two straight years.
Counting the opening game telecast on the Univision network, the complete US average reached 16.1M. The total Fall Classic average in the Japanese market was 9.7M and 8.1M in the Canadian market.
The full playoffs on Fox and its sister channels averaged 8.09M viewers, an eight percent rise compared to the previous year and Fox’s strongest postseason performance after the 2017 season.
MLB stated that the Fall Classic was broadcast in over 200 countries and territories by 44 broadcasting partners in 16 different tongues.
