Who Won the 2023 World Series?
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Fans all over the world have been on the edge of their seats for the last week to watch the 2023 World Series, the most exciting event in baseball. After an exciting postseason tournament filled with upsets, the World Series this year featured an unlikely matchup between the Arizona Diamondbacks and the Texas Rangers, so read on below to find out which of these underdog teams came away with the title.
Who Won the World Series?
For the first time ever, the Texas Rangers have won the World Series. Texas came out strong from the beginning of the series, winning the first game with a close score of 6-5. The Diamondbacks hit back in game two, however, winning a crushing 9-1 victory. From then on it was all the Rangers, who won games two and three 3-1 and 11-7. The Rangers swept the Diamondbacks for a 4-1 series, winning the fifth game with a 5-0 shutout to seal their victory.
Two Underdog Teams
This was notably the first ever World Series in which neither of the teams competing had ever won in any of their World Series appearances before, so tensions were high and both the Rangers and the Diamondbacks clearly had a huge motivation to win. The two teams together had 174 season wins coming into the World Series, the lowest ever for a non-shortened season.
Even though they didn’t come away with the victory, the Diamondbacks’ postseason effort should be applauded. At 125-1, the Diamondbacks’ preseason odds to make it to the World Series were the lowest of any contender since the 2008 Tampa Bay Rays.
Who Won the World Series MVP Award?
The World Series MVP award is one of the most prestigious awards that a single baseball player can earn, and this year the honor went to the Rangers’ Corey Seager. Although this is the first-ever World Series win for the Rangers, this is actually the second time that Seager has won the MVP award.
Seager was drafted by the Brooklyn Dodgers in the first round of the 2012 MLB draft, and in 2020 he won the MVP award for helping lead the team to a World Series win. In 2021 Seager entered free agency and quickly signed a huge $325 million contract to play for the Rangers for 10 years. That investment by the franchise has clearly already paid off.
How Many People Watched The World Series?
Although this was a dynamic World Series and a huge moment for the Rangers, this year’s viewership numbers were the lowest on record since the series was first televised in 1968. The games for this year’s World Series averaged 9,082,000 viewers each, over two million fewer than last year’s series between the Houston Astros and the Philadelphia Phillies.
Viewership for the World Series and for major league baseball in general has been falling since the 1980s, and so far it’s unclear what this will mean for the future of the sport and its popularity.