In a year where most marquee sporting events have failed to reach 2019 levels, baseball’s Home Run Derby posted its largest audience since 2017.
Monday’s Major League Baseball Home Run Derby averaged 7.13 million viewers on ESPN and ESPN2, the largest audience for the event since 2017 (8.35M). The combined audience, which peaked with 8.69 million from 9:30-9:45 PM ET, increased 13% from the last time the event was held in 2019 (6.20M).
The primary ESPN telecast averaged 6.36 million, up 19% from 2019 (5.35M), while a “Statcast” presentation on ESPN2 chipped in 767,000 — actually down 10% from 2019 (849K).
The Derby ranks as the most-watched ESPN program since the College Football Playoff National Championship in January, with the combined audience edging the previous day’s UEFA “Euro 2020” final on ESPN alone (6.49M).
It also surpassed the only other All-Star event in sports since the industry went dark in March of last year, the March 7 NBA All-Star Game on TNT and TBS (5.94M). The NBA All-Star Game included the event most comparable to the Home Run Derby, the Slam Dunk Contest, at halftime.
Kansas City led all markets for the Derby with an 8.2 rating, followed by Denver (7.8), Cincinnati (7.6), San Diego (7.5) and Hartford (6.6M).
In other MLB action, Sunday’s opening round of the MLB Draft averaged a combined 1.03 million viewers across ESPN and MLB Network — up 69% from last year, when the same two networks carried the event on a Wednesday night in June (611K). ESPN alone pulled 781,000, up 77% from last year. The game aired in ESPN’s usual Sunday Night Baseball window.
Figures for last week’s actual MLB games were not immediately available.
[Nielsen estimates from ESPN PR]
