Fox, MLB aim for young fans with early World Series start time

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You’d have to go back to 1987 to find a Major League Baseball World Series Games starting as early as Game 3 will start this year. Broadcast rights holder Fox Television will televise the first pitch of that game at 6:57 Eastern/3:57 Pacific. That’s a Saturday, for those of you keeping score at home.


Other games will start at 7:57/4:57 with the exception of Game 4 on Sunday, which is TBD, depending on when Fox’s NFL schedule concludes its business.

Baseball Commissioner Bud Selig mentioned the child angle when commenting on the schedule. He said, “I am extremely pleased we are able to provide our fans the earliest World Series start time since 1987 with Saturday’s Game Three. The changes we made with FOX last year to start the World Series games earlier helped increase viewership including more young fans and we are optimistic that the earlier start time for Saturday’s Game Three will keep us moving in the same direction.”

“Starting the game earlier will allow more families to watch together,” said Chris Perry, VP U.S. marketing, Chevrolet, a major sponsor of the Series. “This fits perfectly with our commitment to baseball which stretches from youth teams across the country to MLB.”
    
Eric Shanks, President of FOX Sports, added, “We’ve said over the years that if advertisers were willing to support earlier starts at prime time levels, we’d be able to begin games earlier. We’re excited to be working with MLB and Chevrolet, along with our FOX-owned stations and affiliates to make this happen.”