Large Markets Rejoice – MLB on the verge of Getting what they wanted

Large Markets rejoice.  Baseball is on the verge of getting what ESPN and other major media outlets were looking for.  With the Dodgers up 3 -2 over the Brewers and the Red Sox up 3-1 over the Astros.   It is looking like Baseball will get an East Coast / West Coast World Series.   I am not saying that this is a bad thing.  It will be good for ratings.

What I am saying here it that it was bothersome that the Large media outlets were actively complaining about the possibility of a small market world series.  Yes I get it that this is entertainment and the numbers  count.   They are doing this to make money.  The players and the owners are all in it to make money.   We have talked a bit about this before.   The issue with dealing with small market verses large market teams. This is a huge issue.   How do you fix it?

I don’t think that with the current structure there is a way to fix it.  It would take having separate leagues.   Turning one league into just a big market league and the other league into a small market league.  We have that somewhat with the minor league system that baseball already has.  So it would seem a bit silly to split up the Major Leagues like that.

While it is true that the big market teams get bigger numbers.  The statistics also show that over time the number have been on an over all decline.  Even with that decline the World Series still have some pretty good number.   The Highest rated games have all come in the 1980’s.   Of the lowest rated games 5 of the 7 games were in 2014.  One game was in 2008 and the other game was in 2012.   Six of the seven lowest rated games involved the San Francisco Giants.  The 2014 series was between the Giants and the Royals.  The 2012 series was the Giants against the Tigers.  The 2008 series was the Phillies against the Rays.

Big Vs Large Markets

Since this is about large markets being better for World Series television numbers.  That brings up the thought of what denotes a large market.   I know that the Television market is slightly different than the population of the Metro area.  The statistics are easier to find for the Metro area so we will use those for this post.   There are 40 metro areas in the Unites States that have a population of 1.5 million or more.   Of those 23 of the markest have 2.5 Million or more.  I am not sure where the line is for a big market to a large market.   So we will define big markets t have a population of 1.5 million up to 2.5 million.  Large markets to have a population of 2.5 million or larger.

For the lowest rated World Series.  The 2014 Series between the Giants and the Royals.  You have in the Giants the 12th larges metro area with a population of more than 4.5 million and Kansas City the 30th largest metro area with a population of 2.1 million.  Since they are under the 2.5 million threshold that would make them a big but not a large market team.   It is interesting that the 2014 year is the year with the most games in the lowest watched World Series.  It could be a bunch of different things that caused that to happen.  Not just the fact that one of the teams was not in a large market.  Even with these games being the lowest rated there was still 12+ million viewers for each of these games.   Other than Football these were the highest rated programs in those weeks.

I get it.  Ratings are what drives the leagues.  The more viewers the more money that they can bring in.  How ever.   Rooting for smaller market teams to lose for the sake of ratings in Large Markets is just a huge bummer.