World Baseball Classic television audience doubles for 2026 tournament

NEW YORK (AP) — Venezuela's 3-2 win over the United States in the World Baseball Classic championship game was seen by 10,784,000 viewers on Fox and Fox Deportes, nearly double the 5.4 million who watched Japan defeat the Americans in the 2023 final on FS1, Fox Deportes and the network's streaming service.

Tuesday night's game drew an average of 10,228,000 viewers on Fox, the network said Thursday. That was more than double the 4.48 million on FS1 for Japan's 3-2 victory in 2023 and higher than each of the first four games of the 2023 World Series between Texas and Arizona.

The WBC averaged 1,294,000 for its games on Fox, FS1 and FS2, double the 506,000 for the 2023 tournament.

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AP MLB: https://apnews.com/hub/mlb

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A previous version of this story had the wrong teams in the 2023 World Series. Arizona, not San Francisco, played against Texas.