After an MLB season characterized by flat advertising revenues, the year-over-year pricing gaps are soaring as the playoffs get underway.

According to fresh marketplace intelligence from Guideline, which captures agency investment from the six major U.S. holding companies as well as most of the large independent shops, in-game MLB pricing spiked 40% in September. Last month’s leap came on the heels of a somewhat dreary first-half stretch, in which the cost of reaching 1,000 viewers—or “CPM,” in industry jargon—dipped 1.5% to $26.6.

The September figures are based on forward booking data, although thanks to a dearth of necessary make-goods, the official numbers are very likely to match Guideline’s advance estimate of a 40% lift. According to Sean Wright, Guideline’s chief insights and analytics officer, in-game CPMs for the entire third quarter are shaping up to improve 10% versus the analogous three-month stretch in 2025.

Naturally, the cost of reaching baseball fans goes up as the annual postseason cycle begins. According to media buyers, CPMs for NBC’s coverage of the primetime Red Sox-Yankees Wild Card series reached $50, with unit costs landing at some $70,000 a pop. Earlier Wild Card games staged in Atlanta and Houston have fetched CPMs in the $25-$30 range.

Seven of the eight Divisional Series contenders have advanced entering Thursday night, as the No. 4 Yankees get set to square off against the top-seeded Rays in a best-of-five showdown, while No. 2 Cleveland faces the No. 6 White Sox on the other side of the AL bracket. In the NL, top seed Milwaukee will meet the No. 4 Padres, while the No. 2 Dodgers await the winner of the Phillies-Braves series.

Buyers said anyone looking to place a 30-second ad unit in the showbiz section of the Divisional Series menu (read: Yankees-Rays and Dodgers-whomever) will pay as much as $120,000 a throw for the privilege.

Postseason MLB advertisers have much to look forward to as the October shadows lengthen, thanks to a field that’s loaded with major-market franchises. Among the clubs that have advanced or are still in contention for a Divisional Round berth, four of the top five DMAs are represented (New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Philadelphia) and should Atlanta best the Phillies Friday night, the No. 5 market will have been eliminated by No. 7.

The top three DMAs alone account for 17.54 million TV homes, good for nearly 14% of the national base. Of the remaining contenders, the only middle-market reps are Cleveland-Akron (No. 20, 1.56 million TV households), San Diego (No. 30, 1.15 million) and Milwaukee (No. 39, 956,350).

While the extended 162-game MLB campaign effectively makes regular-season buys more of a luxury than, say, an in-season NFL investment, last month’s CPM hikes couldn’t have arrived at a better time for the league’s national media partners. That said, the stagnation in the first half of the MLB season is unremarkable; as Wright said, “My suspicion is it’s the length of the schedule that’s working against them. There’s just maybe less of an urgency when the advertisers think, ‘Well, the season goes on forever and I can just sort of pick and choose my games.’ Whereas in the NFL, if you blink the season’s basically over.”

Speaking of the NFL, buyers went into the 2026-27 season expecting that ratings would be flat-to-slightly-down vs the first few weeks of last year’s campaign, as it was clear as far back as the spring upfront that the league’s media partners wouldn’t benefit from another dose of ratings inflation. Last season’s 7% year-over-year ratings lift was largely a function of Nielsen’s upgrade to its TV measurement currency, a phenomenon that would not repeat itself this fall.

To date, the NFL’s combined TV and streaming deliveries are down a negligible 2.4% versus the year-ago period, which works out to as shortfall of some 500,000 viewers per window.