These days, the sport would throw a parade over the number that the Mets and Yankees drew back in 2000. In this century, only four World Series have averaged more than 20 million viewers. Two of those Series involved teams chasing epic curses (the Red Sox in 2004 and the Cubs in 2016), and the other two involved the Yankees. The last time a Series even sniffed 18 million viewers was 2017, and it’s only gotten worse since then. Hardly anyone watched the COVID Series of 2020; even fewer people watched last year — just 9 million viewers. To give you a sense of how bad it’s become, more people tuned in on average to watch the 1978 World Series than did in the past four World Series — combined.
There are many reasons for this decline: the growing popularity of football; the devastating strike that gutted baseball in 1994; the steroid scandals that followed; the slow pace of the game in a digital click-now era; the fracturing of the American media; and Major League Baseball’s refusal to react to these changes for too long.
Now, baseball has its big chance. This year’s Fall Classic features the Yankees and the Los Angeles Dodgers, two of the game’s most storied teams. They will attract viewers in the nation’s two biggest markets, and they will own a huge market overseas — Japan. Millions will tune in every morning from Tokyo and Osaka to watch Shohei Ohtani, the Dodgers’ Japanese slugger who is playing in his first World Series. And Ohtani isn’t the only big name on the field. Aaron Judge, Mookie Betts, Juan Soto, and Giancarlo Stanton will be there too.
“I’ve been going to the World Series since 1988, and I’ve never looked forward to a matchup like I’m looking forward to this one,” MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred told me. “My deepest hope is that we deliver all seven games to our fans and give them a Series that they really remember due to great performances on the field.”
It certainly has the potential to happen — in part because this matchup should interest fans both young and old. “For our traditional fans,” Manfred said, “it’s a continuation of great players playing against great players. If you think about it, Joe DiMaggio played against Jackie Robinson in a Yankee-Dodger World Series. Mickey Mantle played against Sandy Koufax in a Yankee-Dodger World Series. Now you’re going to have Aaron Judge playing against Ohtani in a Yankee-Dodger World Series.”
That’s important to fans who appreciate history. But what baseball really needs are young fans who may not care about history at all. And with this Series, baseball wins there too. Kids will tune in for Ohtani, Judge, bombs, and bat flips — or, as Manfred said, “everything that’s new, modern, and exciting about the game.” Put simply: It’s the Series that baseball needs.
It’s also one that Manfred deserves. In recent years, the commissioner has put himself on the line, implementing sweeping rule changes to make the game more exciting. He mandated that pitchers face three batters before being removed; instituted a pitch clock to speed up play; banned defensive shifts to create more hits; and limited pickoff moves to encourage stolen bases.
Not everything has worked. The league batting average remains 25 points lower than it was a generation ago; guys strike out far more than they once did. But many of Manfred’s rule changes have succeeded. Games are shorter than they have been since 1985. Players are stealing bases at a rate not seen in more than a century. Ohtani is one of them. He leveraged the rule change this year to become the first player in baseball history to hit 50 home runs and steal 50 bases in a single season. And people are watching. According to Major League Baseball, attendance is up — and viewership is too, especially among young viewers.
These trends will continue over the next week. Even a bad World Series between the Yankees and Dodgers will be a good one by recent baseball standards. But a great Series — filled with drama, comebacks, late-inning heroics, home runs from Ohtani and Judge, and scores that push the Series to seven games — could change everything for baseball. This could be the moment when the sport truly begins to matter again, when the TikTok generation falls in love with baseball, and when older fans remember why they cared in the first place.
The sport may never be what it once was. There is no going back. But there is a way forward, and it’s happening right now on a green diamond, under the lights, on a cool, crisp night in October.
Keith O’Brien is the author of “Charlie Hustle: The Rise and Fall of Pete Rose, and the Last Glory Days of Baseball.”
