TV ratings report: World Series hits a five-year high

The New York Yankees finished off the Philadelphia Phillies Wednesday night to win the World Series -- and also finished off most-watched Fall Classic in five years.

The combination of two big-market, high-visibility teams -- the Phillies were the defending champs, and the Yankees are the Yankees -- and a competitive series gave FOX its best World Series ratings since 2004, when the Boston Red Sox ended their 86-year championship drought.

The six-game series averaged about 19.4 million viewers and a 6.2 rating in the adults 18-49 demographic. Both figures are huge jumps over last year's Phillies-Tampa Bay Rays series, which drew 13.6 million viewers and a 4.4 demo rating. The series peaked with Game 4 (22.76 million), which had the benefit of a big lead-in from late-afternoon NFL games on Sunday.

Wednesday's clincher drew 22.34 million viewers and took a sizable bite out of most of its competition -- CBS' "Criminal Minds" (12.55 million) and "CSI: NY" (12 million) were both well below their season averages, and "CSI: NY" hit one of its lowest marks ever in adults 18-49 (2.8). NBC's "Mercy" and "Law & Order: SVU" and ABC's "Cougar Town" also took hits.

Exceptions to the rule were ABC's "Modern Family," which was down a little compared to last week (8.8 million vs. 9.3 million) but still led all non-World Series shows in adults 18-49, and "America's Next Top Model," which hit season highs in viewers (3.9 million) and The CW's target audience of young women.

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