World Series draws more viewers than Thursday night NFL game

Published Nov. 4, 2022 9:46 p.m. ET

Associated Press

LOS ANGELES (AP) — On a rare Thursday night when a World Series game and an NFL game went head-to-head, not only nationally but in Philadelphia and Houston, it was baseball that drew more viewers.

The Astros' 3-2 victory over the Phillies on Thursday night, which gave Houston a 3-2 series lead, averaged 12,768,000 viewers on Fox. The Philadelphia Eagles' 29-17 win over the Houston Texans averaged 7,860,000 on Amazon Prime Video. Both figures were compiled by Nielsen.

It was the first time since 2013 that the World Series and the NFL have gone against each other on a Thursday night. That year, NFL Network carried the football game.

NFL games traditionally outdraw the World Series, but this is the first year the NFL has sold a package of games to a streaming service. Nielsen and Prime Video have entered into an agreement for ratings, but measuring audience numbers with a streaming package remains a work in progress.

Last Sunday night's Green Bay-Buffalo game on NBC averaged 21 million while ESPN's “Monday Night Football” averaged 15.3 million through the first seven weeks.

Including Fox Deportes and Fox’s streaming platforms, World Series Game 5 was viewed by 13,014,000 people. The audience peaked at 14,613,000 during the ninth inning.

The first five games have averaged 11,642,000 viewers on Fox, up 1% from the same point last year and 24% from the five-game average in 2020.

This year's Game 5 was down 7.6% from last year's matchup between the Atlanta Braves and Astros.

Under Amazon's measurement where it can compile viewing data via devices and account logins, “Thursday Night Football” on Prime Video averaged 9.4 million viewers.

Through eight broadcasts, Thursday night games on Prime Video are averaging 10.01 million according to Nielsen and 11.8 million according to Amazon.

The World Series game drew a 25.9 rating and 50 share in Philadelphia and a 25.5/55 in Houston. The NFL local market data remained unavailable as of Friday night. The Fox affiliates in Philadelphia and Houston were originally scheduled to show the Eagles-Texans game before Monday's rainout of Game 3 pushed everything back a day, and bounced football to other channels.

Per longstanding NFL policy, games not shown on broadcast networks must be available on over-the-air stations in the markets of the participating teams.

The rating is the percentage of television households tuned in to a broadcast. The share is the percentage viewing a telecast among those households with TVs on at the time.

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