David Barron reports that the Astros and Rockets have reached a deal with Fox Sports Southwest that will make them more competitive in some ways, but that may come at a cost to some fans:
The Astros and Rockets will abandon plans to launch their Houston-based regional sports network and have signed new broadcast agreements with FSN Southwest that could produce nearly $600 million for the teams over the next decade and beyond.
The agreement, which was finalized over the weekend and announced Monday, will end the 20-month legal battle between the teams and the network and ensures that Houston’s two oldest big-league sports franchises will air on the cable channel that helped launch the era of regional sports networks 20 years ago.
“We’ve reached a very good agreement — certainly better than either team could have done by itself,” said Rockets president George Postolos. “It’s like the Humphrey Bogart and Claude Rains characters in Casablanca — the beginning of a beautiful relationship.”
The most immediate impact on Rockets fans will be the return of virtually all Rockets games to cable, beginning with tonight’s game against the Memphis Grizzlies at Toyota Center. FSN Southwest has the right to produce the remaining 68 games not scheduled as part of the national network television packages, and FSN said virtually all of those games will air on cable.
Rockets games have aired for the last two seasons on KNWS (Channel 51). Channel 51’s schedule, however, will be reduced to include only games that cannot air on FSN Southwest because of other commitments.
For Astros fans, the new deal means more games on television — a minimum of 130, up from 120 a year in recent seasons. Again, officials said, the “vast majority” will air on FSN Southwest, leaving only a few games on Channel 51 or another over-the-air carrier.
The increased emphasis on cable will be a hardship for some fans in Greater Houston, where only 54.5 percent of TV households have cable and the combined cable/satellite penetration rate of 73.4 percent is well below the national average of 85.1 percent.
Longer term, one can’t help but wonder if this won’t hurt the fan base of both teams because of Houston’s cable/satellite penetration. Short term, however, one hopes that the enhanced revenue situation will help the Astros in securing the services of one Carlos Beltran.
