In 2022, Major League Baseball introduced a new playoff format. This with a Wildcard Series as opposed to a one-game wildcard elimination setup. The fans have responded positively, as television ratings for both the Wildcard Series and the subsequent Division Series have trended upward.
Looking first at the Wildcard Series, the only other time MLB used this multiple-game, round one format was in 202o, when the postseason was more of a tournament due to the pandemic-shortened 60-game season. According to Awful Announcing.com, the nine games in the 2022 wildcard round averaged nearly three-million viewers. That figure is better than the television draw for three of the four Division Series in 2021, and the far better (64%) than the 2020 ratings for the first round of playoffs.
The highest-rated series of the wildcard round, not surprisingly, was the Mets versus Padres series, which averaged 3.6-million viewers. This figure was aided by the placement of all of the games in prime time, though Game 3 was up against Sunday Night Football.
Moving to the Division Series, the good news continues. Ratings for the 2022 Division Series were up 21 percent over the same round in 2021, making the 2022 Division Series the most watched since 2017 according to Front Office Sports.com. On average, 3.4 million people watched the 2022 Division Series.
Interestingly, in what may be the most notable trend of all, baseball’s postseason had a slight shift to younger viewers in 2022. From the Front Office Sports article cited above, the number of 18-34-age range viewers watching the Division Series rose 22 percent. Viewers aged 17 and younger were up nine percent. While modest, this is encouraging, as baseball has by far the oldest viewing audience of the major sports, which has not been a good sign for the game’s future popularity. One reason for the increased audience for the Division Series could be the presence of the New York Yankees, who were eliminated in the Wildcard Game by the Boston Red Sox in 2021.
The ratings news reversed, though slightly, in the League Championship Series. In 2022, 5.2-million viewers tuned in for the ALCS, and 4.6 million watched the NLCS. Last year, 4.7 million watched the ALCS between the Astros and Red Sox, and 5.2 million saw the Braves take on the Dodgers in the NLCS. In terms of national market size, the teams represented in the two 2021 LCS were from markets number two (Los Angeles), number six (Houston), number eight (Atlanta), and number ten (Boston). This year, the number-one market (New York) was represented, along with number four (Philadelphia), and number 28 (San Diego) to go along with Houston.
Overall for MLB, the ratings story is a good one. While some feel the first round should be best-of-five, and that may ultimately happen, the fans tuned into the best-of-three in an impressive fashion. With the New York and Los Angeles markets bounced from the postseason, it will be interesting to see how the Phillies versus Astros World Series does in the ratings. Usually, four of seven World Series games are scheduled for Tuesdays and Wednesdays, when sports competition for viewers is fairly minimal. This year, because of lockout-induced delay of the season, four games are scheduled for Fridays (typically the worst television night of the week) and Saturdays (when college football reigns supreme).
For now, MLB can take the 2022 postseason as a win, with the jury still out on the game’s pinnacle event. Perhaps next season the ratings can get a boost by having the number one market in the World Series, with the team’s home games being broadcast from Queens.
