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Venezuela-USA World Baseball Classic final draws big numbers
As I wrote in a premium post Wednesday, the World Baseball Classic posted stunning records through the semifinals, and that seemed very likely to continue with Venezuela's thrilling 3-2 win over the United States (off a ninth-inning RBI double from Eugenio Suárez) in the gold-medal match Tuesday night. Well, Fox released the Nielsen numbers for the final Thursday evening, and they did indeed hit another record:
How big is that number? Well, Michael Mulvihill (Fox Sports' president, insights and analytics) had one interesting comparison:
That is indeed true, with the 2025 NBA Finals (Indiana Pacers-Oklahoma City Thunder, won by OKC) averaging 10.27 million viewers despite going seven games. However, that was historically low (the least-watched Finals since the COVID-altered 2021 Finals, and the third-lowest since 2007). Still, it's remarkable that the final of a 2006-debuting tournament still marred by MLB teams' restrictions on players (Team USA couldn't use All-Star closer Mason Miller in the final thanks to an agreement with his club team, the San Diego Padres, on his usage across games) beat the final of a well-established league.
Of course, that doesn't mean WBC rights are suddenly more valuable than NBA rights. For one thing, this is a rarer tournament with a lot less inventory. And while these quarterfinals and semifinals also set remarkable records, this is still just one year, and one with a U.S. run to the title game and multiple dramatic finishes (always a key thing). But it does speak to just how impressive this number is.
And it's again worth noting how this just adds to the records set by this tournament over its run. Fox noted here that the tournament overall averaged 1,294,000 viewers across FOX, FS1 and FS2 (not counting Spanish-language coverage on Fox Deportes, which brought in notable audiences of its own), which was up 156 per cent over 2023 (506,000). That meant it ranked as the most-watched WBC ever across English language networks.
As I discussed in that premium post Wednesday, the WBC ratings success came with significant quarterfinal and semifinal records for Fox as well. And it fit into a larger trend of international sports events (the 4 Nations Classic, the Olympics, and more) drawing big audiences. The final numbers here don't alter any of those conclusions, but they do reinforce just how important the right kind of international sports events can be at the moment.
And those events matter in many countries beyond the U.S. as well. An Associated Press Sports article from Regina Garcia Cano Thursday on the reaction in Venezuela's capital of Caracas has a lot of notable elements. Here are a few quotes from it:
Acting president Delcy Rodríguez declared a national “day of joy” after the game ended, making it a nonworking holiday for anyone except essential workers. Not that anyone needed permission to skip work or school. It was a given the moment the game ended and the noise began.
People banged pots and pans across Caracas as a racket of honking horns from cars and motorcycles took over some roads. Venezuelans in public plazas sang the national anthem with tears streaming down their faces. The entire city seemed to be awake well past midnight. Grocery carts at 24-hour stores filled up with beer.
...“This triumph isn’t just celebrated in Venezuela. In every corner of the world, there is a Venezuelan,” said Yenny Reyes, a mom of two young baseball fans.
“I’m convinced that this is Venezuela’s year,” she said. “This is the beginning of many good things to come for Venezuela.”
Whether a World Baseball Classic title will actually have a notable impact in Venezuela (and just how that might show up) remains to be seen. But it's worth noting that there have been a whole lot of international sports moments with significant political impacts in the past, from the 1936 Berlin Olympics (and Jesse Owens' success there in particular) to the 1972 Summit Series and the 1980 Miracle on Ice. Sports do matter, and international sports events particularly matter, even beyond raw viewership numbers. And this WBC is just the latest example of how much the right international event can resonate with big audiences.
