2013 MLB All Star Game: By The Numbers

It’s been two days since the American League’s 3-0 victory over the National League in the 2013 MLB All-Star Game and according to all reports, it was a smashing success for Major League Baseball. Obviously the New York Mets’ Citi Field was sold-out (a record crowd of 45,186 descended upon Queens for the game) for all the events but the real successes came from the millions that tuned in to the game across the country and the millions more that talked about on social media.

According to the New York Daily News, the contest was FOX’s highest-rated program since May’s American Idol finale as it achieved a 8.1 rating, making it the highest rated show on the night easily.

The two biggest television markets for the game were New York (shocker) and Detroit according to the NYDN. New Yorkers that didn’t make the game contributed to a monsterous 11.3 overnight Nielsen rating, which is a 16 percent increase from 2012’s game in Kansas City. The Motor City had the biggest number however, as Motown scored a 20.3 overnight Nielsen rating (a 26% increase from 2012) as the city tuned in to see Tigers’ pitcher Max Scherzer start for the AL as well as to see Tigers’ manager Jim Leyland oversee the AL team.

On social media, the All-Star Game’s dominance continued as it was the most tweeted about event of the night by a wide margin. One odd example of this was a adventurous fan that ran onto the field during the game after proclaiming his intentions to do so only if he was retweeted 1,000 times. At the end of the night, 851, 192 tweets were posted about the All-Star Game according to the New York Daily News and that came to a head when the New York Yankees’ legendary closer Mariano Rivera came into an All-Star Game for the last time in his career. Over 14,000 tweets were posted per minute as Rivera warmed up to the iconic “Enter Sandman” by rock legends Metallica and closed out the eighth inning without incident.

All in all, Commissioner Bud Selig has to be satisfied with Tuesday’s event as it surpassed last year’s game in nearly every capacity. With the MLB facing big issues on attendance and steroids, Tuesday was a welcomed blast of good fortune for America’s past time.

(Information taken from New York Daily News).

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Aaron J. Coleman is currently a sport management major at Drexel University in Philadelphia, PA minoring in Communication (with a focus in Public Relations). He was born and raised in Upper Marlboro, MD, a suburb outside of Washington, DC. He is currently a supervisor for Drexel’s Intramural Sports program and also an intern for the Arena Football Legaue’s Philadelphia Soul franchise. He covers the Chicago Bulls, New York Yankees, and Washington Redskins (his favorite squads along with the Washington Capitals and Drexel Dragons) for sportsfansnews.com. Follow Aaron on Twitter @shutupCole.