The Chicago Cubs evened up the young 2016 World Series last night, though Fox Sports may have been Wednesday’s real winner.
Game 2 earned an 11.3 rating/19 share, according to Nielsen’s overnight TV ratings. That’s up 22 percent from last year’s second contest (a 9.5 for the New York Mets versus Kansas City Royals), and 28 percent better than the 2014 version (an 8.8 for San Francisco Giants-Royals). As a matter of fact, the 11.3 marks the top metered-market rating for Game 2 of a World Series since the Philadelphia Phillies took on the New York Yankees in 2009, which got a monster 13.6.
Click here for Game 1’s strong numbers from Tuesday evening. When all eyeballs were tallied, the 2016 World Series opener ended up scoring 19.786 million total viewers across Fox broadcast, Fox Deportes and Fox Sports Go — the most for a Game 1 since 2004.
The next night, from 8-11 p.m. ET, Fox averaged a 12.3/20 in the very preliminary Nielsen ratings. Naturally, those numbers handed the network a first-place primetime finish from the early metric.
Fast national numbers will be available in an hour or so, with final Game 2 figures expected to be released later this afternoon.
Today is a travel day for the teams. Tomorrow night, the Cleveland Indians will visit Chicago for an 8 p.m. ET start.