ST. LOUIS — Monday night's Cardinals game was a thriller, but fewer people were in the stands than a typical regular-season game.
Disrespect from TV network executives may be to blame.
"I thought it was bull crap," said Mike Sanford, a loyal baseball fan.
Sanford wanted to be in the stands Monday. Instead, he had to settle for a barstool at Jack Patrick's, and that's only after he was off the clock.
"If I could have gotten off work, I would have went yesterday. I know there’s kids in school whose parents would love to take them, because you don’t know when the next postseason run might be," he says.
Mike wasn't the only one.
Despite being a "can't miss game," thousands of Cardinals fans did.
Total paid attendance for the NLDS Game 4: 42,203.
It was the first-ever non-sell out playoff game in Busch III history.
Even fewer walked though the gates.
The maximum capacity at Busch III is just under 46,000.
"I don’t understand why they didn’t have a prime time game," says Sanford.
The 2 p.m. first pitch was most likely to blame.
Cable companies broadcasting the games get to pick the time slots. Of all the teams still in the postseason, St. Louis is the smallest TV market.
St. Louis is the 21st largest market in the U.S. but compared to teams like the New York Yankees, Los Angeles Dodgers and Washington Nationals, our audience size is much smaller.
Sanford suggests changing up the times just to be fair.
"Alternate them between the west coast team, east coast team. One day, one night," he said.
Despite the time slot, the game did well locally as far as TV ratings are concerned.
At it's peak, according to data from Nielson, 45% of all TVs turned on in the St. Louis area during the 10th inning, had the Cardinals game on their TV.
We reached out to the Cardinals organization for their take on all this. They didn't call us back.
