Quote:
Originally Posted by professor ape
Valid points from you and the previous posts. A key issue is that baseball is a daily event. Football games are once a week so even when you have a night game, staying up late for one night is a mild annoyance. Baseball is six or seven nights a week. The average fan isn’t willing to invest three-plus hours in a game.
I grew up a baseball junkie and it remains my favorite game. That being said, we went to the DC United soccer game and it was wonderful to have the game run for almost exactly two hours. I’m not saying that baseball should target two hours but having constant action for a fairly well defined time period was refreshing,
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I get that. I personally think too much is made about the length of baseball games. Most of them are about the same length as football or basketball games, approximately three hours. The last two minutes of a football and basketball game can take an hour sometimes. I think the difference is the pace of those games is quicker than most baseball games.
Also, baseball is a regional sport whereas football is national. Unless the World Series is compelling with two great teams or a backstory like the 2004 Red Sox or 2016 Cubs, most people who aren't fans of the two teams in the World Series will watch something else. The Super Bowl is an all-day event with a two-week buildup. It is a lot like a heavyweight championship bout in boxing and we had the New England Patriots versus the Los Angeles Rams in this year's Super Bowl. The game turned out to be a dud, but the ratings were huge. However, the World Series featured the Boston Red Sox and Los Angeles Dodgers and most fans didn't watch it. The Red Sox are no longer an underdog team trying to overcome a curse and the Dodgers were in the World Series the year before.