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The second game of the 2017 World Series, will likely be lauded as one of the most entertaining in the history of baseball.
That’s not an overstatement.
The eight combined homers were the most in a World Series game ever. The five combined extra-inning dingers are the most in a game – regular season OR postseason – ever.
Don’t even get started on Game 5, a 13-12, 10-inning, thriller that featured a three-run, 9th-inning comeback from the Dodgers and a walk-off single from Alex Bregman.
Sounds pretty awesome. It probably was.
But, likely half of Major League Baseball’s target demographic was staring at the back of their respective eyelids.
In order to witness Bregman’s heroics you had to endure 12 pitching changes and five hours and 17 minutes of baseball.
On average, we only spend a little over two hours binge-watching the shows we find most compelling, according to a June 2016 report from Netflix, forget over five hours of baseball with monotonous breaks.
This isn’t a new issue for baseball, or for any league that starts an event at 8 p.m. or later.
The working schlubs from the west coast are just leaving the office at 5 p.m. while the east coast stiffs are heading to bed before it’s over.
There doesn’t seem to be a perfect solution to the problem, especially given who is watching MLB.
“The target market of Major League Baseball generally consists of males between ages 18 and 49,” wrote Christopher Raines of bizfluent.com in September, 2017. “Advertisers covet this demographic for its perceived value, says TV Quarterly Magazine. These potential consumers are deemed more likely than older ones to switch brands or product preferences.
“Yet, the highest level of the national past-time has struggled to hit this mark. In 2013, half of MLB’s regular season viewers were age 55 or over, says a 2013 Nielsen report.”
The National Sleep Foundation recommends that adults ages 26-64 get seven to nine hours of sleep per night.
A 2015 study conducted by Edison Research concluded that 28% of adults are awake by 5:30 a.m. and another 23% wake up between 6-6:30 a.m.
So, let’s do the math:
At best, it’s a logical assumption that if a good chunk of Americans are sleeping normally, and that 51% of them are awake by 6:30 a.m. that means they’re hitting the sack by 11:30 p.m. at the latest.
| World Series Game | Game Ending Time (EDT) |
| Game 1 – Dodgers 3 Astros 1 | 10:28 p.m. |
| Game 2 – Astros 7 Dodgers 6 (11 inn.) | 12:19 a.m. |
| Game 3 – Astros 5 Dodgers 3 | 11:46 p.m. |
| Game 4 – Dodgers 6 Astros 2 | 11:06 p.m. |
| Game 5 – Astros 13 Dodgers 12 (10 inn.) | 1:17 a.m. |
| Game 6 – Dodgers 3 Astros 1 | 11:22 p.m. |
The deciding Game 7 of the 2017 World Series has a first pitch time of 8:20 p.m. EDT. It’s probably going to be awesome. Someone let me know.