ESPN earned a 5.8 overnight rating for the Giants' 3-0 win over the Mets in the NL Wild Card game last night, marking the highest-rated Wild Card telecast since the format began in '12. The previous record was last year, when ESPN drew a 5.7 overnight for the Astros-Yankees AL Wild Card. Last night's game also ranks as the highest-rated MLB game on ESPN since '03. Giants-Mets drew a 16.0 local rating in S.F.-Oakland-San Jose, a record for an MLB game on ESPN, and a 15.6 in N.Y., also a record. Giants-Mets peaked at a 7.1 rating between 11:00-11:15pm ET. In '14, ESPN drew a 4.1 overnight for its coverage of the Giants-Pirates NL Wild Card (Josh Carpenter, Assistant Editor).
OH, CANADA: Sportsnet on Tuesday night averaged 4.02 million viewers for the Blue Jays' 5-2 extra inning win over the Orioles in the AL Wild Card game, marking the net's most-watched program of the year to date. The game peaked with 5.38 million viewers just before 11:00pm during the bottom of the ninth inning (Sportsnet). The CP's Cassandra Szklarski noted Sportsnet utilized TBS' feed "instead of the usual local production featuring Sportsnet’s play-by-play crew," led by Buck Martinez. Sportsnet has the rights to the MLB postseason through the World Series, and the net has the "option of either taking the Fox broadcast" or the MLB Int'l broadcast. Rogers President of Sportsnet Scott Moore said regardless of how far the Blue Jays progress in the playoffs, the net will be "taking the international feed because he negotiated to have Martinez as part of that broadcast" (CP, 10/5).
SNEAK PEEK: MLB Network will offer a free preview to customers of AT&T U-Verse, Comcast, Cox, DirecTV, Dish Network, Frontier, RCN and Verizon FiOS from today through next Tuesday. The preview will make MLB Net's Division Series telecasts available to more viewers than any prior year. MLB Net will televise Game 2 of Giants-Cubs NLDS on Saturday night and Dodgers-Nationals NLDS Game 3 on Monday night (MLB Network).
