What’s Next for Baseball and the World Series

In each ballpark where October baseball was played, the allure of the playoffs was no different from any other year. Packed to the brim with fans, the Arizona Diamondbacks and Texas Rangers made playoff runs marked by star-hitting and close comeback games. The fact that these two low-ranked, underdog teams made it to the big dance was perhaps the biggest surprise of the tournament. Despite 100-plus-win seasons from the Atlanta Braves, Baltimore Orioles, and Los Angeles Dodgers, all of these teams were eliminated early on in the playoff picture. Despite the close margins of the Divisional and League Championship series on both sides, this year’s World Series was a dominant, one-sided gentleman’s sweep with just one close game. Possibly as a result, this series as a whole posted the lowest television ratings in World Series broadcast history. How did baseball disappoint this year?

The low TV ratings are, in some sense, a reflection of the two teams that made it. Though the Diamondbacks have won a World Series before, they are a comparatively smaller MLB franchise, and the Texas Rangers live in the shadow of the storied Houston Astros. Houston’s reputation from their trash can era has made them hated by many neutral fans around the league, but this has only drawn more viewers hoping to see them lose. Arizona never really had the fanbase or the rivalries to support their run to the finals. Like the Rangers, the Diamondbacks faced off against one of baseball’s most popular but hated franchises in the Philadelphia Phillies. Without this, some argue that the World Series lacked a big storyline to make it worth watching for neutrals.

The counterargument goes that the runs of both teams to make it to the World Series were both incredible in their own right, regardless of whether either side had beef with the other. Take the Rangers, for example. They made themselves seem like the team to beat as they knocked off big contender after big contender on their road to the World Series. In the Wild Card matchup against the Tampa Bay Rays, they put eleven on the Rays while allowing just one run, silencing a hitting core consisting of first baseman Yandy Diaz, third base slugger Isaac Paredes, and right fielder Josh Lowe, who were heavily favored to run away with the series on the money line. Fine, they made it through to the Divisional series, but now they had to knock out a Fall Classic favorite in the Baltimore Orioles. Not only did they advance, they swept the favorites. While Game 1 was a nailbiter, Games 2 and 3 were largely without incident, and the Rangers cruised into the ALCS where they faced their biggest challenge—the Houston Astros. This one went the distance, and though the Rangers got off to a good start, winning the first two games of the series, the Astros took the next three and threatened to close off the series in Game 6. The Rangers left no questions hanging after the elimination game, with a monster five-run ninth inning to cap off a 7-2 win. Astros fans felt they had a lot to debate about the worthiness of the two teams entering the World Series. However, the level to which Rangers right fielder Adolis “El Bombi” Garcia dominated the Houston pitchers in Game 7 was not up for debate. He was a step ahead of the Astros pitching staff for the entire series, batting in 15 runs and scoring seven himself, with most coming off his five home runs.

The Diamondbacks were the National League mirror image of the Rangers in many ways. Like the Rangers, they swept a Wild Card and Divisional Series that they were unfavored in. Though their sweep of the Brewers did not attract too much attention, the sweep of the Dodgers certainly achieved that effect. The Diamondbacks set the tone early with an 11-2 victory, and consistent hitting from designated hitter Tommy Pham, right fielder Corbin Carroll, and second baseman Ketel Marte powered them through the remainder of the series, with identical 4-2 wins to cap off the sweep. Fans lauded it as one of the greatest upsets in baseball history. They also fought a tooth-and-nails series against the Phillies, featuring mostly low-scoring games. However, the Phillies set the tone in Game 2 with a 10-0 domination of the Diamondbacks, where the Phillies bats tore apart relievers Joe Mantiply and Ryne Nelson. The Diamondbacks took the next two games by one run each and leveled the series at 2-2. Game 5 was a five-run Phillies rout but Game 6 was a four-run Diamondbacks rout. Though the Phillies sometimes got pitching shutdowns, the Diamondbacks’ bats were reliable when they had to be, and Marte emphasized that after putting together a twenty-game postseason hit streak—the longest in baseball history. Those bats kept the Diamondbacks competitive in Games 3, 4, and 6. With everything on the line, the Diamondbacks needed to take control in Game 7, and starting pitcher Brandon Pfaadt coupled with the stellar Arizona bullpen put the Phillies bats to bed, sending the visiting Diamondbacks to the World Series.

In both of those intense, seven-game series, television ratings were not a concern. In the Phillies-Diamondbacks series, there was an average of 5.34 million viewers, while the Rangers and Astros saw 6.77 million viewers tuning in on average. Of the two markets in each game, the Rangers were smaller than the Astros and the Diamondbacks were smaller than the Phillies, which could partially justify the disconnect between the World Series and Championship Series ratings. However, small markets have graced the MLB championship before—including the 2006 Series between the Detroit Tigers and the St. Louis Cardinals and the ‘97 series between the Cleveland Indians and Florida Marlins. Ratings from those series were significantly higher than this year. In fact, the four least-viewed World Series are the last four, with this year’s series edging out the 2020 COVID-induced sports downturn by 700 million viewers. This begs a bigger question: Why is baseball losing its popularity?

Suggesting the on-field performance has been worse would be benign. Game one of this World Series was a back-and-forth slugfest that was finally decided in the eleventh inning by El Bombi Garcia, who put one into the stands and walked off the game. Though the series lacked more close games, the offense never dried, with the Diamondbacks devastating the Rangers 9-1 in Game 2. Game 3 was a low-scoring game won by just two runs, and Game 4 was a slugfest for both sides, with a final score of 11-7. Even when the Rangers were finally able to limit the D-Backs’ offense, Texas capped off their World Series victory with five complete runs. There have been plenty of 4-1 series orchestrated by the Yankees and Red Sox and Giants in previous seasons, some with results far more boring and predictable than this one, but none of them even contended for the lowest viewership.

There’s only one place left to point: American sports culture. Baseball isn’t as popular amongst Americans as it was in years prior, and many point to the World Baseball Classic as an example. The American team has performed terribly since the tournament’s inception––a shocking result considering the MLB founded the tournament as a means of creating a stronger international baseball community. Especially amongst youth, baseball has lost its flair compared to other sports like basketball and soccer, which are both on the rise in the States. The MLB’s decline lines up perfectly with the rise of the J-League in Japan and the Dominican Professional Baseball League in the Dominican Republic. Though the MLB has been investing time and money into the league, making rule changes, and trying to boost national youth participation, nothing seems to be working. Is this the end of America’s golden age of baseball? It’s too soon to tell, but research shows that the MLB is sliding down the slippery slope to irrelevance among the American people.