Sportswriters have been penning baseball’s obituary for decades, claiming that America’s pastime is past its time. The game is too slow, too stodgy, too old, too boring, they said. The kids don’t care.

But baseball is not dying. It’s thriving.

A thrilling World Series, set to resume tonight with Game 6 in Toronto, will bring to a conclusion another blockbuster Major League Baseball season. The Blue Jays are one victory away from their first title in 32 years but must win against the game’s best team and best player. A couple weeks ago, the Dodgers’ Shohei Ohtani a delivered arguably the single greatest individual performance in the 122 years of the World Series era by hitting three home runs and pitching six shutout innings. And then, 10 days later, he nearly outdid himself by reaching base nine times in one game.

The rule changes implemented three years ago have all worked—most notably the pitch clock, which has cut the average game length down from 3 hours and 10 minutes in 2021 to 2 hours and 38 minutes this past year. Fans have responded to the quicker pace of play; attendance has surged, growing for the third straight year to an all-time high of 71.4 million. TV ratings are up again (more than 32 million people globally watched Game 1 of the World Series). Record revenues are flowing into the coffers of Major League Baseball. And after years of worry about the game’s graying audience, the fan base is getting younger. Ohtani is the biggest star, but Aaron Judge, Mookie Betts, and Bryce Harper have all broken through.