Dodgers vs. Blue Jays Game 7 Draws 26M Viewers, Highest World Series Rating Since 2017

Fox Sports announced that an average of almost 26 million people tuned in to watch the Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Toronto Blue Jays in Game 7 of the World Series.

That's the best single rating for the Fall Classic since 2017. For the climactic encounter, viewership peaked at 31.5 million.

The Dodgers are celebrating their second straight title with a parade on Monday, and the Dodger Stadium grounds crew is hard at work preparing the field for the festivities:

The Athletic's Richard Deitsch noted the ratings from Canadian television are still forthcoming. The Blue Jays' Game 5 winner averaged 7.2 million viewers, so the winner-take-all Game 7 will presumably surpass that.

This is part of a wider trend as MLB saw healthy bumps in the regular season and playoffs.

Rather than "ruining" baseball, it turns out the Dodgers' aggressive offseason last winter might have led more fans to get invested, even if only in the hope of seeing L.A. face-plant on the biggest stage.

Those fans nearly got their wish as Los Angeles needed a game-tying home run from Miguel Rojas in the ninth inning to stave off defeat. Manager Dave Roberts also called upon Yoshinobu Yamamoto, his Game 6 starter, to pitch the final 2.2 innings.

Not all Game 7s are created equal. The Houston Astros and Washington Nationals each won the final game by four runs when the 2017 and 2019 World Series went the distance.

The battle between Los Angeles and Toronto offered a little bit of everything and had fans on the edge of their seats from start to finish.