FOX, FOX Deportes & FOX Sports GO Combine to Deliver Most-Watched World Series Game 1 Since 2004
Cleveland, OH – Across FOX Sports, FOX Deportes & FOX Sports GO, World Series Game 1 between the Chicago Cubs and Cleveland Indians registered 19.786 million viewers, according to fast national figures released by Nielsen Media Research, and is baseball’s most-watched World Series Game 1 since 2004’s epic matchup between the St. Louis Cardinals and the Boston Red Sox (vs. 23.2 million viewers).
Tuesday night’s 6-0 Indians shutout recorded an average of 19.4 million viewers on the FOX broadcast network, 297,000 viewers on FOX Deportes, and an average minute audience of 121,073 on FOX Sports GO, the television network’s live streaming platform. FOX delivered a fast national rating/share of 11.3/20 with 19.4 million viewers for Game 1, which is up +30% in viewership (vs. 14.9 million) and +26% in rating/share (vs. 9.0/17) over last year’s Game 1. Compared to 2014’s World Series Game 1, the margins are even greater with last night’s game up +55% (vs. 7.3/12 – 12.2 million viewers).
In the male demos, FOX saw strong increases across the board for Tuesday night’s game over last year in M12-17 (+68%; 3.2 vs. 1.9), M18-34 (+17%; 5.5 vs. 4.7), M18-49 (+18%; 7.1 vs. 6.0) and M25-54 (+22%; 8.3 vs. 6.8).
Additionally, last night’s broadcast on FOX is the highest-rated and most-watched Game 1 of the World Series since 2009’s New York Yankees vs. Philadelphia Phillies matchup (vs. 11.9/19 – 19.5 million viewers) and is the highest-rated and most-watched baseball telecast of any kind since 2014’s World Series Game 7 when the San Francisco Giants beat the Kansas City Royals (vs. 13.7/23 – 23.5 million).
Viewership on the FOX broadcast network peaked at 22.7 million between 9:15pm – 9:30pm ET.
FOX Deportes averaged a .99 household rating and 297,000 total viewers, which ranks as the most-watched World Series game on Spanish-language television since Game 7 of the 2014 series. When compared to last year’s World Series Game 1, FOX Deportes is up +49% on total viewers from Mets vs. Royals (vs. 200,000 viewers).
On the digital side, last night’s Game 1 is the second-highest average minute audience of any authenticated event in FOX Sports GO history.
FOX Sports and FOX Deportes provide exclusive television coverage of World Series Game 2 between the Cleveland Indians and Chicago Cubs tonight beginning at 6:00 PM ET with a live pregame show from Progressive Field in Cleveland on FS1.
