Continuing the trend of record-low sports ratings, World Series viewership hit an all-time low in Game 1.
Tuesday’s Game 1 of the World Series (Rays-Dodgers) averaged a 5.1 rating and 9.20 million viewers on FOX (9.48M including Fox Deportes and streaming), marking the lowest rated and least-watched game in the history of the event. The previous lows were a 5.9 for last year’s Astros-Nationals Game 4 and 9.84 million for Phillies-Rays Game 3 in 2008, a Saturday night game that began after 10 PM ET due to rain. [Related: World Series ratings history.]
As goes without saying, the Dodgers’ win also ranks as the least-watched World Series opener, falling below the previous mark of 12.191 million in 2014 (Giants-Royals). Viewership declined a quarter from last year’s Game 1 (Nationals-Astros: 12.194M) and a third from 2018 (Dodgers-Red Sox: 13.76M).
The record-low start for the World Series is in keeping with the overall trend facing the sports media industry. Game 1 came just ten days after the conclusion of the least-watched NBA Finals on record and less than a month after the least-watched Stanley Cup Final in 13 years. It should be noted that those events were taking place four months out-of-season, while the World Series began at its usual time.
Game 1 delivered the fourth-largest non-NFL sports audience since the wave of cancellations and postponements that decimated the sports industry in March, trailing Game 7 of the Braves-Dodgers NLCS on FOX and FS1 Sunday night (9.66M), Saturday’s Georgia-Alabama college football game on CBS (9.61M), and last month’s Kentucky Derby (9.26M).
It averaged more viewers than any game of the NBA Finals, which topped out at 8.96 million for Game 5, but trailed five of the six games in 18-49 (2.4), four of the six in 25-54 (2.9) and all six in 18-34 (1.8).
In a year marked by massive declines in viewership, the 25 percent drop for Game 1 looks almost modest. By comparison, viewership fell 49% for the NBA Finals (43% in Game 1) and 61% for the Stanley Cup Final (60% in Game 1). Even the earlier rounds of the MLB Postseason suffered sharper drops, with the League Championship Series down 30% and the Division Series down 40%.
A possible reason for the comparably small decline is that — in stark contrast to other events this fall — the World Series faced less sporting competition than usual Tuesday. Last year’s Game 1 aired on NBA opening night, facing a TNT doubleheader that averaged 2.9 million viewers. By contrast, there were no competing sporting events facing Game 1 this year.
It should be noted that while there was no sports competition, Game 1 is taking place within two weeks of an election that has spurred unusually strong viewership for the cable news networks.
[Nielsen estimates from ShowBuzz Daily 10.21]
