Baseball broke containment during the World Series

With the swing of the bat, another October has come and gone for those of us who love baseball. As listless and familiar as the rest of the season can feel, October baseball at its best is pure chaos: Night after night, there’s the promise of something new, and you might see something that’s never been done before and talk about it for years to come. Saturday’s winner-take-all Game 7, between the Toronto Blue Jays and Los Angeles Dodgers, was one of those nights — and perhaps, one hopes, the beginning of a whole new group of fans.

About 26 million people in the United States watched the game on Saturday, making it the most watched game Most watched World Series game Since 2017. And across borders, 45% of Canada’s population It was tuned in for at least part of Game 7. Viewership peaked at 31.5 million in the US between 11:30pm and 11:45pm ET – impressive considering it was Halloween weekend and people were likely outside (I personally was sitting on one phone in the corner of a bar with a bunch of other people, screaming at every subsequent play). The final game — a thrilling game featuring extra innings and a bench-emptying moment — was an instant classic, capping a major league baseball regular season that It also saw significant increases in viewership. when Add viewer data from JapanGame 7 was the most-watched MLB game in 34 years; More international viewers watched this World Series than ever before.

However, baseball as a whole remained stagnant: viewership and attendance were lower than they had been decades earlier, and it had lost the title of “America’s Pastime.” At least according to surveys. (More than 127 million people I watched Super Bowl Lakers This year for comparison.)

Perhaps with that in mind, bands are trying to reach younger, more diverse audiences Through social media And even Hello Kitty Bubbleheads. MLB also introduced a host of changes to liven up (and speed up) games, such as a pitch clock and automatic “ghost runners” on base in extra innings. Next season there will be So-called automated umpires at home plate. The league is also doing its best to create an attractive and lucrative market Japanthe place where baseball has been a national pastime for as long as possible.

World Series viewership numbers are a promising sign of improvement. But can the league and teams capitalize on the current momentum and create a new subset of fans? On Friday night, I started seeing a lot of jewelry accounts on Instagram posting about the players’ very beautiful — and very expensive — jewelry. Vladimir Guerrero Jr.’s diamond-encrusted numbers pendant hanging around his neck; Miguel Rojas’s gorgeous Van Cleef & Arpels Alhambra collection diffuses the earlobes and neck; Yoshinobu Yamamoto’s sapphire tennis necklace sparkled as he finished a heroic seventh game after throwing 96 shots the day before. Granted, the people running these accounts are year-round baseball fans, but I’ve never seen them discuss this before, and anyway, players wearing Van Cleef jewelry It was something of a subplot All season long. Have your jewelry accounts flipped the game out of curiosity and discovered there’s something for them too?

On TikTok it was More of the same – A new set of viewers, brought into the game of baseball through different stories and quirks. Fashion people Analysis of players’ clothing And made by K-Pop fans Players’ photo cards As they do with their favorite members in groups — “K-pop sports” As one person said. Posts containing hashtags related to the World Series have soared over the past few weeks on the platform, according to Kat Marquis, North American sports league partnerships leader on TikTok: #worldseries, with 2.8 million global posts, is up 160 percent; #Dodgers posts up 210 percent; #bluejays posts rose 325 percent between October 21 and November 3.

One of my favorite things to see on TikTok are fan edits (often made by users who look like teenagers) of game highlights compiled together with some popular songs. They often contain frenetic cuts, super transition effects, and dramatic filters: here you go New York Yankees’ Cody Bellinger is turning to Ethel Cainwhich is actually just a video longing for Bellinger’s time in the Dodgers; The Seattle Mariners won the division title It is set to Disney’s “Honor to Us All.” Mulan; The Dodgers’ Shohei Ohtani and rookie Rōki Sasaki With Taylor Swift’s “Father Figure” in the background. If MLB wants to help reach new, younger audiences, it needs to take a page from Hollywood’s book Just hire TikTok fan editors To help them in the players market.

Bluesky Saturday night felt like live blogging was what it always was – traffic to the site It rose during the match. Once again, people I’d never seen mention baseball were there with the sports fans, and we were all holding our breath through every excruciating and exhilarating moment.

Baseball break containment. (If you, too, have suddenly caught up in the madness of this World Series, there’s good news: The World Series Baseball Classic is starting in 120 days.)

Baseball resonates as a culture because it’s just another way to tell stories: the fictional tale of the Seattle Mariners wrapped up, or Guerrero Jr.’s quest to win a World Series ring and give it to his father, himself a former professional baseball player. There were unlikely heroes who were She was added to the roster at the last minute and continues to create special moments. Then of course there’s Ohtani, perhaps the greatest to ever play the game, who finally managed to win multiple World Series in spectacular fashion after playing (and losing) for six years for the Los Angeles Angels.

There are also, of course, descriptive narratives. the Donald Trump’s trade war against Canada, where the Blue Jays are based, escalated into a messy diplomatic conflict between America and one of its closest allies. advertisement Which took place during the first match, embroiled the world championship in a political battle between Trump and Canadian leaders. The Games themselves were largely apolitical, but chaos at the highest levels of power was still a shadow over everything.

More than a quarter Many of the MLB players on the roster for Opening Day this year were born outside the United States, including some of the league’s biggest stars — it’s one of the best parts of baseball, like the American sport itself. But while the Dodgers played this weekend in Toronto, federal immigration agents continued to besiege the Los Angeles area, at times Wear Halloween masks While carrying out raids. One-third of Los Angeles’ population is foreign-born, and it’s represented by a team as diverse as she is — a city of immigrants with its back against the wall while her team goes way back. We watch baseball for these stories, too.

MLB has taken the adapt-or-die mentality to heart, taking a seemingly ancient (and free) sport and tweaking it to suit a modern audience. Early signs suggest that MLB’s new strategies are paying off. Much of what brings entertainment to Big-C culture comes from how audiences interact with it: critiques and analyses, fan edits, memes, live reactions, packed stadiums, viewing parties, contests and look-alike parades in cities under attack. We’ve been really spoiled by this season, and I already feel a tinge of nostalgia that will only deepen as time goes on I The old one that tells kids about the 2025 World Series.