Major League Baseball Sets New Records

While some were crying out for further action on the pace-of-play front, Major League Baseball was busy setting a series of viewership, attendance and app download records. Between press releases from various clubs as well as MLB themselves, baseball’s popularity may not be waning afterall.

Baseball as a whole appears to be in a strong place as before the regular season started, spring training attendance eclipsed the four million mark, setting a new record. Leading up to the games that matter saw seamheads pass the five million download mark across all platforms for the MLB At-Bat in the preseason. That is roughly the equivalent of the combined population of Los Angeles and San Diego downloading the app prior to the first pitch on Sunday night. The Advanced Media portion of MLB — those in charge of the MLB At-Bat app — claim users were up 30% during spring training compared to last year.

As games across the country kicked off, baseball enjoyed more success as MLBAM set another record with 60 million fans turning into games either live, via video-on-demand system. If the preseason 5 million download mark is impressive, Monday saw the At-Bat app accessed an incredible 9.1 million times, crushing the previous single day record by 40%.

Individual teams partook in the record setting celebrations as the reigning American League champion Kansas City Royals reported a record 11.7 local TV rating for their home opener. That is compared to last year’s KC home opener rated at 6.2, however, that came as their fourth scheduled game of the season and was following a rain out and an 0-2 start. Following a flurry of trades and signings, the San Diego Padres and their fanbase entered the 2015 season with much hope. That hope translated to a 34% increase in television ratings for their home opener over last year. Of course all TV ratings must be taken with a grain of salt as those figures do not include the previously mentioned millions of fans streaming games.

Major League Baseball certainly isn’t perfect — instant replay, concussion issues and blackout policies immediately come to mind — but it is clear the sky isn’t falling just yet either.