Before I start posting the NFL preseason TV schedules, we have some ratings news for ESPN’s Opening Night game between the defending World Series Champions St. Louis Cardinals and the Miami Marlins at the new Marlins Park in South Florida.
ESPN2 received a 1.8 overnight rating which was flat with last year’s game which pitted the San Francisco Giants and the Los Angeles Dodgers.
Locally, St. Louis saw an astounding 15.9 overnight rating, the highest for any local market for an ESPN/ESN2 Opening Night Game and Miami had a 5.4 which set a record for a regular season MLB game on the ESPN Family of Networks.
Here’s the press release from MLB.
2012 MLB SEASON OPENS WITH STRONG TV RATINGS
With three games in the books, early signs point to fans of baseball on television being excited about the return of the national pastime.
Last night’s Opening Night telecast on ESPN – a 4-1 victory by the defending World Series Champion St. Louis Cardinals over the Miami Marlins in the debut of the new Marlins Park – registered a 5.4 rating in Miami, the highest rating ever on record for a regular season game on ESPN in Miami.
St. Louis registered the highest rating in the country at 15.9, the highest rating in any market for an Opening Night telecast on ESPN or ESPN2 in the past five years. Nationally, the game drew a 1.8 overnight rating in the metered markets, even with last year’s Opening Night game between the Dodgers and Giants, also on ESPN.
The MLB Opening Series, two games that took place in Tokyo last week between the A’s and Mariners, registered an 11.3 rating on Japanese network NTV. The rating marks a +10% increase from the 10.3 rating averaged between the Red Sox and Athletics in 2008, the last time MLB opened the season in Japan.
In today’s Opening Day action, ESPN2 will feature the Red Sox at Tigers at 1:00 p.m. ET followed by the Marlins at Reds at 4:00 p.m. In tonight’s only prime time game, MLB Network will present the Dodgers at Padres at 7:00 p.m. ET, featuring a simulcast of the Dodgers’ local feed with the legendary Vin Scully in the booth.
And on YES, the Mets-Yankees Spring Training game set a ratings record for a New York regional sports network. According to YES, the network saw a 1.29 household rating with 95,000 average households viewing the game. YES says the previous high was set on March 3, 2009 when the Yankees took on Team USA before the World Baseball Classic. That game saw a 1.24 household rating with an average 92,000 households watching the game.
The information came directly from YES Network.
More posts are on the way.
