WNBA Finals and MLB playoffs lead the business of sports success stories this week

Tom Mayenknecht: B.C. Lions, Dallas Cowboys struggle through tough weeks.

Published Oct 18, 2024  •  3 minute read

Christine Sinclair of Canada acknowledges the fans as she leaves the field during the second half against Australia at B.C. Place on Dec. 5, 2023, in Vancouver. Photo by Craig Mitchelldyer /Getty Images for Football Austra

Bulls of the week

Women’s sports in general and women’s basketball in particular continued to shine among the biggest winners in the business of sport this past week.

Part of that was Game 3 of the WNBA Finals between the New York Liberty and the Minnesota Lynx, which was the most-watched championship game in league history. The game drew an average national American audience of 1.4 million viewers and peaked at two million.

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Star and game-changer Kaitlin Clark became the first rookie ever named to the All-WNBA team with yet another feather in her cap.

Yet it didn’t end there as reports surfaced around the significant investment that TNT is making in Unrivaled, a new three-on-three women’s basketball league that will have more than 45 prime-time games telecast on the Turner cable network.

Closer to home, Christine Sinclair, who will be inducted into the B.C. Sports Hall of Fame in the athlete category next June, played her last pro soccer match Tuesday night at B.C. Place in Vancouver. She did so amid news that she will be gifted an ownership share in Vancouver Rise, a women’s club that will have a place in the new Northern Super League that will make its debut in 2025.

Already an icon as the world’s leading all-time soccer goal-scorer, Sinclair’s ownership gig as part of Greg Kerfoot’s franchise will only inspire more girls and women to play soccer and dream big on-and-off the pitch.

Yet make no mistake; there’s nothing hotter in the business of sport this week than Shohei Ohtani, the Los Angeles Dodgers and MLB overall.

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After logging terrific ratings for the National League Division Series last week — including a global TV audience of more than 20 million viewers for the decisive Game 5 against the San Diego Padres — the MLB scored new threshold numbers domestically, globally and in Japan for Game 3 of the NL Championship Series against the New York Mets.

Taken together with the ALCS between the New York Yankees and the Cleveland Guardians, the MLB is basking in its best TV audiences in 15 years and driving best-ever streaming numbers.

Those numbers will only escalate if the World Series features a showdown between the Dodgers and the Yankees.

Bears of the week

The B.C. Lions had another tough week, falling to the Saskatchewan Roughriders 39-8 in the second to last weekend of the CFL regular season. That took the steam out of whatever plans the Leos had to host a western divisional semifinal playoff game at B.C. Place in a year in which they’re hosting the Grey Cup in Vancouver on Nov. 17.

Yet, the slide of the Lions is nothing compared with the embarrassment that Jerry Jones and the Dallas Cowboys felt in Week 6 of the NFL season.

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In one of the worst losses of his 35-year reign as Cowboys owner and general manager, Jones could only watch helplessly as 3-3 Dallas suffered a 47-9 defeat at the hands of the now 4-1 Detroit Lions.

What’s worse? The loss came in front of a AT&T Stadium home crowd of 93,644 fans and the largest NFL TV audience last week, with an average U.S. audience of 24.056 million tuning in on FOX.

Tom Mayenknecht is the host of The Sport Market on Sportsnet 650 on Saturdays from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. The Vancouver-based sport business commentator and principal in Emblematica Brand Builders provides a behind-the-scenes look at the sport business stories that matter most to fans. Follow Mayenknecht at: x.com/TheSportMarket.

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