Below The Beltway

Much is being made of a report in yesterday’s Washington Post about the abysmally low ratings for Washington Nationals games on television:

 The Washington Nationals are drawing the smallest U.S. regional television audience in baseball this season, attracting less than one-third the average number of households of any other team, according to an analysis of Nielsen Media Research data published yesterday by SportsBusiness Journal.

The Nationals, whose games are broadcast on either MASN or MASN2, are drawing a 0.39 average rating and an average of 9,000 households in the Washington market, according to the report. That’s a decline of about 43 percent from last season’s totals, and a significantly lower regional sports network audience than any other U.S. team has drawn this season. The figures do not include potential viewers outside the Washington market; MASN’s reach stretches from Harrisburg, Pa., to Charlotte.

The Baltimore Orioles, whose games also appear on MASN and MASN2, are averaging a 3.05 rating and 33,000 households in the Baltimore market. Aside from the Nationals, the Kansas City Royals have attracted the lowest regional audience, approximately 28,000 households.

At the same time that fewer than 10,000 people on average are tuning into games, however, the Nationals are pulling in fairly respectable attendance numbers at home games:

“We don’t run MASN. TV ratings used to be my life [with the CNN-owned Braves]. Now I pay no attention to it. It’s entirely their deal. The Nationals just get a check,” said Nats President Stan Kasten, referring to MASN and MASN2 that broadcasts all Nats and Orioles games and are predominantly owned by Angelos.

“However, this I do know,” Kasten said. With that he spread his arms toward Nationals Park, once again filling nicely, if not spectacularly, with a crowd of 26,820 that brings Washington’s average attendance to 29,689, 15th best of 30 teams. “We have always had the highest confidence about this market.”

That Nats anomaly –normal MLB crowds but infinitesimal TV ratings that would have to triple to match the next-worst team — has caused a buzz of perplexity through baseball. Every other team has more local TV households than fans in the ballpark. For many clubs, the ratio is several-to-one. The worst ratio — except the Nats’ — is the Orioles’ 26,059 fans to 33,000 TV households. But even that is still more TVs turned on than fans in the seats.

How can any team draw 30,000 breathing humans but repel almost every potential TV viewer? Could the combination of a wonderful new park, coupled with an awful (injured) team really produce such a ratio? Is the park so good that it is, temporarily, disguising an almost total lack of a true fan base? What does such a number portend for the future?

Thomas Boswell, for one, isn’t optimistic:

If it’s true that you could fit every Nats TV viewer into the team’s upper deck — with room to spare — perhaps there’s a frightening future in that stark stat. Can the franchise risk alienating the affections of a city that, just three years ago, rejoiced when the Nats were in first place at the all-star break and the darlings of the entire sport? Washington actually tasted the summer joy that attends a mere wild-card race, even when you don’t make the playoffs. That whiff of success makes the current 102-loss pace more bitter.

Of course, the numbers we see now could easily change if the Nationals start winning games and contending for the post-season.

That isn’t going to happen this year, though, and it’s unlikely to happen any time in the next several years unless the Lerner family puts its money where it’s mouth is and starts building a team that can actually win games. If they don’t, and the Nationals spend the next 5 years, or longer in the cellar in the NL East, then that crowd of 26,000 at Nationals Park is likely to be alot smaller.