When the total numbers trickled in, Game 7 Dodgers-Jays ended up with roughly 26 million watchers, beating Game 7 Thunder-Pacers by 58.9 percent. The lopsided comparison led to some media discussion about what baseball has done right of late, in contrast to the NBA:
In that conversation, a cohort conveyed feeling almost gaslit by a national sports media that treats pro basketball like a much larger concern than pro baseball. The World Series gets more viewers than the NBA’s big event, yet ESPN and other national platforms discuss basketball by what seems like an order of magnitude more. That’s perhaps paradoxical, but also not the point of this particular post.
Obviously this championship contrast isn’t exactly a one-to-one comparison. OKC-Indiana Game 7 effectively ended early with Tyrese Haliburton’s Achilles tear, whereas the World Series finale was one of the greatest baseball games ever played. That said, take out Saturday night’s dramatics and the comparison of Game 1s isn’t flattering to the NBA. Dodgers-Jays Game 1 drew roughly 33 percent more viewership than what the last NBA Finals Game 1 yielded. You can say that the Dodgers are a big brand, in contrast to the NBA’s small market standoff, but the last World Series included a team from outside the country. Speaking of which, SportsNet has reported that, in addition to the 26 million Americans who watched Game 7, Dodgers-BlueJays averaged as astounding 10.9 million viewers in little Canada.
It was just recently, in pre-Covid times, that you expected the NBA Finals to command more audience than the World Series. But, post-Covid, the World Series has outdrawn the NBA Finals in 4 out of 6 matchups. Pre-Covid, the NBA Finals got better viewership in 9 out of the last 10 comparisons. The exception in that span was Cubs-Indians, a 7 gamer that was guaranteed to make history.
So is baseball actually America’s second favorite sport now? I’d argue that the main reason MLB has a case here isn’t the pitch clock, though I do like the pitch clock. I also wouldn’t cite “too many 3-pointers,” or other aesthetic theories as the main reason the NBA fell behind. No, the championship game chasm is mostly due to recent structural CBA changes that Adam Silver instituted.