World Baseball Classic Has Rating Surge

Here is the whole webpage but I will point out a few cool stats.

Hiram Bithorn Stadium in San Juan, Puerto Rico drew a sellout crowd of 19,483 on March 9th for the game between Puerto Rico and the Netherlands, and duplicated the feat with 19,501 fans in attendance for a rematch between the teams in the Pool D championship game on March 11th.

Saturday’s game between the United States and Canada drew 43,000 fans to the Rogers Centre. Only three games between the Blue Jays and Yankees, and three games between the Jays and Red Sox had a higher attendance at the venue over the last year.

Sunday night’s game between the United States and Venezuela posted a 2.0 rating with 2,645,000 viewers tuning in, ranking as the most watched World Baseball Classic game ever, eclipsing the 2006 second round game between Mexico and the U.S. which was seen by 2,458,000 people. In addition, it was the most watched sporting event on basic cable for the week.

Pretty cool. At the beginning of this tournament I bashed the WBC, but slowly I have changed my mind. The timing still sucks, but the games are extremely entertaining and somewhat prideful. Last night's USA/ PR was very entertaining and a hell of a game. oh yea, USA won.