When the Houston Dynamo struck a deal nearly two years ago with CSN Houston to broadcast Dynamo games, it seemed a big step for the organization. Not only would CSN Houston carry Dynamo games, they would also produce live pregame and postgame shows, a weekly in-season magazine show, a monthly offseason show, a preseason preview, a postseason wrap up special, and a behind-the-scenes documentary series.

Under the three year agreement, the Dynamo, in partnership with CSN, envisioned being able to bring a quality and depth in coverage that few other MLS teams could match. Unfortunately, it all went wrong when the channel failed to secure carriage deals with major cable and satellite providers. While the coverage of the team was indeed high quality (or so I am told, I don’t actually get CSN Houston), the viewership was limited to primarily Comcast customers, and therefore two seasons of potential growth of the fan base (especially coming off of the World Cup) was lost.

Therefore, news in recent months of a potential impending deal that would see AT&T and DirecTV acquire the network and rebrand it as Root Sports Houston gave hope that households across Houston would soon have access to the Dynamo. That hope was, at least temporarily, dealt a big blow yesterday.

As reported yesterday evening by David Barron of the Houston Chronicle, if the deal goes through, Root Sports Houston will drop the Houston Dynamo contract. In addition, Root Sports Houston has said it will eliminate 75 of 115 positions within the network post acquisition.

AT&T/DirecTV also is dropping Dynamo contract, but club president Chris Canetti says companies have expressed interest in new deal. — David Barron (@dfbarron) September 17, 2014

Root Sports is known for running a fairly tight ship in its networks across the country. It is fair to say that the high quality of programming that CSN Houston provided will vanish post acquisition to be replaced by a lower budget and lower quality range of programming.

The range of programming under the Dynamo contract was likely the reason for terminating the contract. As reported by Barron, Root Sports Houston is interested in entering into a new contract with the Dynamo, but it would no doubt be centered primarily around game coverage without the bells and whistles that the existing contract offered up.

Among the 75 employees who will be let go is Sebastian Salzar, who acted as host or co-host for much of the non-game programming. Salazar did an excellent job covering the Dynamo and has gained some national attention, it seems likely he will be one of the employees offered jobs elsewhere in the NBC Sports Group.

Root Sports did not drop the contract for Houston Dash coverage. The fact that the Dash coverage is focused primarily on games, this would seem to fit well with the network’s typical approach to covering soccer. Given that Sebastian Salazar did play-by-play for the Dash, however, there will likely be a change in the announcing team.

While CSN Houston did not pan out the way the Dynamo might have hoped, it was a calculated and worthwhile risk for the Dynamo to take. No other station could have offered the variety and quality of Dynamo coverage that CSN Houston was willing to provide. It is very disappointing that now that all of Houston may finally have access to the channel, the non-game programming may not be worth watching anyway.

It would be easy to point fingers on the entire CSN Houston debacle. At this stage, however, there is little point in doing so. It is water under the bridge; time to move on. We can only hope that wherever the Dynamo land their next broadcast deal, they retain Eddie Robinson and Glenn Davis on the call and they get even half the non-game coverage that they got from CSN Houston.