Baseball’s All-Star Game edges down to record low viewership

LOS ANGELES (AP) - Baseball’s All-Star Game edged down to a record low in viewership as it reversed last year’s increase.

According to Nielsen ratings released Tuesday, Major League Baseball’s exhibition game last week drew 8.7 million viewers on Fox.

That’s just under the previous record low of 8.71 million viewers in 2016, and about 6 percent less than 2017’s audience of 9.28 million.

Although the game ranked as the week’s No. 2 program, it was topped by NBC’s “America’s Got Talent,” which drew 11.3 million.

Maybe predictability is part of the problem: The American League beat the National League 8-6 for its sixth straight win. Those who skipped the game missed seeing a record 10 home runs, nearly double the previous high.

Summertime series reruns have driven viewers into the arms of reality and competition shows, which claimed half of the top 10 spots.

NBC was the week’s winning network in U.S. prime-time viewing, averaging 4.3 million viewers. CBS had 3.8 million, ABC had 3.4 million, Fox had 3.3 million, ION Television had 1.36 million, Telemundo had 1.17 million, Univision had 1.14 million and the CW had 790,000 viewers.

ABC’s “World News Tonight” led the evening newscasts with an average of 7.8 million viewers. NBC’s “Nightly News” had 7.2 million and the “CBS Evening News” had 5.5 million.

Fox News Channel was the week’s most popular cable network, averaging 2.38 million viewers. MSNBC had 1.89 million, USA had 1.39 million, HGTV had 1.28 million and Hallmark had 1.26 million.

For the week of July 16-22, the top 10 prime-time shows, their networks and viewerships: “America’s Got Talent” (Tuesday), NBC, 11.33 million; MLB All-Star Game, Fox, 8.7 million; “60 Minutes,” CBS, 7.69 million; “The Bachelorette,” ABC, 6.3 million; “Celebrity Family Feud,” ABC, 6.08 million; “The Big Bang Theory,” CBS, 6.06 million; “World of Dance,” NBC, 5.9 million; “Home Run Derby,” ESPN, 5.6 million; “Big Brother” (Thursday), CBS, 5.56 million; “Young Sheldon,” CBS, 5.5 million.

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ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Co. CBS is owned by CBS Corp. CW is a joint venture of Warner Bros. Entertainment and CBS Corp. Fox is owned by 21st Century Fox. NBC and Telemundo are owned by Comcast Corp. ION Television is owned by ION Media Networks.

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Online:

http://www.nielsen.com