Netflix’s first foray into Major League Baseball delivered a rather ho-hum audience.
Per multiple reports, Netflix averaged 3.0 million viewers for its Opening Night MLB telecast between the New York Yankees and San Francisco Giants last Wednesday. That delivery fell a bit short of NBC’s primetime MLB broadcast the following night, which was billed as the official Opening Day of the season. NBC averaged 3.2 million viewers on Thursday night for a game between the Arizona Diamondbacks and the defending World Series champion Los Angeles Dodgers.
As one would expect, Netflix’s MLB audience was a far cry from what the streamer has pulled for its NFL games in the past couple of years. (Netflix averaged 27.5 million viewers for its Christmas Day NFL doubleheader last year.) And whether or not 3.0 million viewers should be seen as a success is ultimately up to the observer.
NBC’s Thursday night opener with 3.2 million viewers was the most-watched Opening Day game since 2017 (barring the COVID-impacted short season in 2020). By those standards, Netflix came pretty close to what could now be considered a high-end Opening Day baseball audience. But on the flip side of the coin, Netflix is paying a whopping $50 million for that game, the Home Run Derby, and the Field of Dreams Game later this season. That price tag might be pretty steep for only a few million viewers.
From a fan perspective, Netflix’s debut got off to a rocky start as well. Viewers found the experience to be too self-promotional at times, and Netflix missed some key moments like the first ABS challenge in MLB history.
This is the first year of Netflix’s three-year MLB experiment. That’s just nine events over three seasons to help determine if the streamer wants to stay in the baseball business. So far, the jury is still out.
About Drew Lerner
Drew Lerner is a staff writer for Awful Announcing and an aspiring cable subscriber. He previously covered sports media for Sports Media Watch. Future beat writer for the Oasis reunion tour.