ABC - BUILD A BALLPARK AND THEY WILL COME

BUILD A BALLPARK AND THEY WILL COME

Despite the fact that the television networks have written off Saturday as hopeless and have programmed it in recent years mostly with reruns and reality shows, viewers returned to their sets en masse last Saturday to watch the World Series, even though the game was delayed by rain and even though it had to compete with Halloween activities. The game averaged 15.09 million viewers in the primetime period between 9 30 p.m. and 11 00 p.m., drawing more than twice the combined number of viewers who tuned into college football on ABC and NBC. (NBC drew just 2.24 million viewers, one of the smallest numbers ever to tune into any of the major broadcast networks during primetime in recent history.) On Sunday the World Series virtually shut out the competition with an estimated 20.02 million viewers, peaking in the 8 30 p.m. half hour with 23.61 million. And that was after a football overrun at 7 00 p.m. which drew a mind-boggling 30.57 million viewers.

02/11/2009