• by Wayne Friedman , October 30, 2014

Suffering through the first six games of historically low-rated World Series games between the San Francisco Giants and Kansas City Royals, the seventh and final game proved to be a big winner.

The first six games averaged a Nielsen 3.2 rating among key 18-49 viewers and 12.3 million overall viewers. But the seventh game rocketed up to a 6.6 rating among 18-49 viewers, more than double the average of the first six games. Total viewers gained 90% --- 23.5 million viewers -- over the first six-game average.

The last seven-game World Series -- between the Texas Rangers and St.Louis Cardinals -- earned a 7.4 rating among 18-49 viewers for the seventh game and 25.4 million total viewers.

Still, the 2014 World Series posted record low results overall.

On the plus side, Fox made significant advertising revenue gains for having a seven-game World Series -- as well as higher viewership. The 25 hours of the 2014 World Series averaged a 3.7 among 18-49 viewers, raising Fox's season-to-date prime-time average by 20% to 2.4 from a 2.0.

Social-media gains were another silver lining. The Kansas City Royals posted over 2 million team mentions and related hashtags; the San Francisco Giants earned 1.4 million, according to analysis by social media monitoring company Infegy.