Last night’s Field of Dreams game delivered in just about every possible way, giving us one of the most memorable White Sox games outside of the playoffs. Naturally, the event that was just as good as the movie resulted in some historic television numbers too.
FOX announced this afternoon that the Dyersville, Iowa contest was the most-watched regular season baseball game on any network in 16 years, bringing in an average of 5,903,000 viewers between the main network and FOX Deportes. Those numbers also made it the most-streamed regular season major league game in FOX Sports history, not necessarily surprising given the advancements in platforms over recent years but still impressive.
The network says peak hours fell between 7:45 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. Central Time, when 6,094,000 viewers tuned in. Among the top five markets were Chicago (11.2/25), New York (6.6/14), St. Louis (6.0/13), Hartford (5.6/12), and Kansas City (5.6/12).
Michael Mulvihill, the EVP of Fox Sports, added some more information on his personal Twitter. He said last night’s game was the most-watched regular game among women and girls since 1998. It was also the most-watched regular season among teens (12-17 years of age) in ten years. Overall, the event absolutely met and probably exceeded expectations going in.
On the advertising end, an article by the Sports Business Journal was published several days ago saying the game was expected to bring in more ad sales than any other regular-season contest since FOX partnered with the league 25 years ago. Though an exact figure was not given, revenue was estimated to double that of the second highest regular season game.
Given the success of last night’s Yankees-White Sox thriller and the announcement of another Field of Dreams event again in 2022, don’t be surprised to see this extend even further to become an annual occurrence. Though I personally would have preferred for this to be a one and done type of deal, I have no objections to seeing a few more games being held at the iconic location. I just don’t know how Major League Baseball will be able to top not only the game but the theatrics surrounding it before it gets stale. Heck, maybe (in an unsurprising move) the Sox will be given the chance to defend their perfect 1-0 record in Iowa? If that’s the case, sign me up for round two.
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Featured Photo: White Sox/Twitter
