Houston Astros: Sunday's Game Drew Audience of 1,000 Viewers on CSN Houston

Remember a couple weeks ago when Forbes published a post claiming the Astros were the most profitable team in baseball? Most of that assumption was tied to team owner Jim Crane also holding a controlling stake in CSN Houston. Forbes published its own rebuttal to the the post, picking apart the math and pointing out the struggles of CSN Houston and its ability to get picked up by local cable providers.

All this came to a head during Sunday’s Reds/Astros broadcast. The Houston Chronicle reports the broadcast averaged only around 1,000 viewers on CSN Houston, mainly due to the NFL competition as the Titans/Texans game stretched into overtime and garnered a 24.8 rating.

"The Astros on Saturday had a record low audience for their game against the Angels on CSN Houston. The game had a 0.04 Nielsen rating, which represents an average audience of about 915 households or about 1,000 viewers on average. The previous low was 0.05 for an Astros-Reds game on Sept. 9, 2012, on Fox Sports Houston, the team’s former carrier."

Not good, but honestly is it really that surprising other than the eye-catching 1,000 viewers number? Who in their right mind is going to spend time on a Sunday afternoon in the fall watching a 51-99 MLB team play on television? The only person I can think of is Pete Rose or any other nut that bets on baseball. And in that scenario, Charlie Hustle would watch on the Cincinnati station. Actually, come to think of it, he was probably watching the NFL, too.