• by Wayne Friedman , Staff Writer, October 11, 2023

Real-time sports action -- there's nothing like it. A clock ticking down adds another dramatic element. (Perhaps comedy?)

If you are airing sports on television networks you need a lot of this -- or your audience can get bored. It makes sense, then, that Major League Baseball would look to improve on this key factor. 

This year, the MLB instituted a pitch clock that limited the amount of time a pitcher can take between pitches -- 15 seconds with bases empty and 20 seconds with runners on base. Batters must be in the box and alert to the pitcher by the 8-second mark or else be charged with an automatic strike.

It is kind of like the offensive unit of a football team getting off a play in 40 seconds.

This year's game was 24 minutes shorter than a year ago and 30 minutes faster than 2021, when the average game ran for two hours/38 minutes. In 2021, it was the average game was three hours/10 minutes.  By way of comparison, the average NFL game takes 3 hours/12 minutes.

In addition, paid in-stadium game attendance was the highest since 2017. While there were some early snafus with pitchers and batters zoning out from time to time, many may say it was a success. 

All this is not to say MLB will not catch up anytime soon in an important monetizing factor of other major sports -- TV viewership -- but it is getting closer.

For comparison, consider other similar non-time factors for sports around the world  -- such as professional cricket. That's the sport that was always presumed to be the predecessor to baseball -- a sport that has the elements of “striker” (in U.S. baseball, hitters) and “bowler” (pitchers).

And if you think cricket's not a big deal, the 2023 season of the Indian Premier League drew more than 500 million viewers -- with 32% growth in TV ratings over the year before.

This week, India's win over Australia in the ICC Men's Cricket World Cup 2023 peaked at 26 million live concurrent viewers for Disney+ Hotstar. Now you know why this can be a focus during Walt Disney financial and earnings releases.

Even considering MLB gains, it still doesn't have an overall timing element attached to its games. Other major U.S. sports --  NFL, NBA, NHL and college basketball/football contests -- do have that. The NFL, NBA, and NHL can go into overtime as well. But, even then, there are time restrictions.

Do these sports heighten the drama, the immediacy, games/contests that can in theory go into another metaphor for “sudden death” -- and drive viewership? 

Some advertisers pay a premium to get placement of their messaging at the end of these contests.

Are there other sports like MLB in this regard? Think tennis. But that sport’s sometimes continuous action of the game can put it on another level. And sometimes the investment in a long four- to five-hour mens' match can deliver heightened interest. 

One 2010 men’s single match in Wimbledon, where John Isner beat Nicolas Mahut, holds the record: 11 hours and five minutes -- over three days.

We don’t know the TV viewership of that event. But we know live sports stuff TV can do well on the most important factor for viewers and marketers: Engagement. We don’t always need to look at the clock to keep our eyeballs glued to the screen.