Bowl Suggestion ..

[BiscuitEater]

While I'm exceedingly happy we are headed to a bowl for the 6th straight year .. I do think there are WAY TOO MANY bad bowls now. With ~ 40 bowls with 80 teams out of 120 or so is too many bad teams are going to too many empty stadiums. High school playoffs around the country are attracting bigger crowds. They have 5-7 teams in bowls this year.

I suggest that they reduce the number back to ~20 bowls (40 teams) and eliminate bowls by attrition cutting bowls with the less attendance and payout. Cut the bottom ten next year and force the bowls to compete with each other for final 20 spots. The more the bowls compete, the better it will be for players and fans.

Thoughts?

 

[BigMotherTucker]

So you want the NCAA to cut bowls, corporate partnerships, TV revenue, and viewership because you think there are to many bowls? Won't happen...

The idea that the bowls are a reward for worthy teams is an outdated concept. Money is the name of today's game. And they (whoever they are) won't rest until they have all of it.

My boss was on a rant today about how only 9 win teams belong in bowls.... Tell that to the fans of all the have-nots out there.

It is what it is. Evolve with it or don't... That's your choice, but it ain't changing.

 

[was21]

As long as the corporate sponsors aren't losing money they won't cut them back. Somehow their accountants are figuring ways to make it all profitable....advertising, marketing, tax write offs...whatever.

 

[mcdawg22]

I see both sides of it. I do like having a lot of CFB to watch before it's over for 9 months.

 

[KeyserSoze1999]

The endless stream of little Bowl Games is here to stay unfortunately just because of the TV money and Sponsor money.

However I would like to change the Bowl names to be like the "ORANGE BOWL presented by Capitol One" instead of the "CAPITOL ONE Orange Bowl". Also change any Bowl Games that just has a sponsor name like the QUICKLANE BOWL" to the "MICHIGAN BOWL presented by QuickLane" or the "OUTBACK BOWL" to the "TAMPA BOWL presented by Outback Steakhouse".

My reasoning for this is how silly this looks when looking back on them. The Gator Bowl has been called---The Mazda Gator Bowl, the Outback Gator Bowl, the Toyota Gator Bowl, The Minolta Gator Bowl, the Progressive Gator Bowl, and The TaxSlayer.com Gator Bowl. The Sugar Bowl has been called---The USF&G Sugar Bowl, The Nokia Sugar Bowl, and The Allstate Sugar Bowl. Alabama once played Colorado in "The BlockBuster Bowl"---now I have to explain, "Well kids BlockBuster was a store where we rented movies before those big RedBox movie vending machines outside Walmart." Really we are lucky that there was never an Enron Bowl, Worldcom Bowl, Adelphia Communications Bowl, Global Crossing Bowl, or a Studebaker Bowl.

 

[aTotal360]

Because YOU don't want to watch the game, you think they should get rid of it. Are you pissed because they moved Around the Horn to another channel or time slot? I don't care if they had 85 bowl games. I'm only going to watch the ones I want to. If kids get to go have a paid for vacation at the end of their year, so what. Let them do it. Typically it makes everyone a lot of money. Corporate sponsors are footing the bill. And the "everyone gets a trophy" talk about this is ignorant too. An 8 win team isn't that much better than 6 or 7 win team. Especially with scheduling discrepancies.

 

[OleMissLogo]

An 8 win team isn't that much better than 6 or 7 win team. Especially with scheduling discrepancies.

Exactly. The 5-7 teams went 3-0 in bowls. Any cutoff is an arbitrary cutoff. I like being able to watch a game at 1:30 on a Monday. I don't get that during the season.

 

[HomeBoyDawg]

This may be incredibly naive but I think tax write offs are why sports have gotten completely out of control with ridiculously high salaries, the average family not being able to afford to attend college/pro games, and, if you will, too many college bowl games. I wouldn't mind seeing Uncle Sam cut back on tax write offs and see what happens.

 

[esplanade91]

I was loosely involved in the naming rights of 2 bowls this year, and these small bowls aren't very expensive, actually. And you can imagine that it indexes really, really well.

 

[patdog]

They'll never cut 20 bowls out. But something is going to happen after this year. They'll either cut a couple of bowls or pretty much do away with the 6-win minimum.

 

[engie]

They'll never cut 20 bowls out. But something is going to happen after this year. They'll either cut a couple of bowls or pretty much do away with the 6-win minimum.

I think we see some more FCS programs make the jump to the Sun Belt, Mountain West, MAC, and C-USA over the next few years. Sam Houston St, North Dakota St, Richmond, Montana, Jacksonville St, etc. As power 5 autonomy really comes into play, I think we see a lot of teams make this jump. It's essentially creating a new tier and creating an easier transition, which is still lucrative by those teams' standards.

I agree that there's too many bowls, but we're so far down the rabbit hole now, I don't know how you ever reverse it. But it really doesn't matter. All of the SEC bowl games are interesting matchups once you get past the disappointment everyone but Bama and OM probably have in their landing spots. To me, outside of less than a handful I was interested in previously, bowl season really starts tomorrow.

 

[57stratdawg]

I kind of agree, but I do wish the SEC would have a more tiered bowl selection process. I liked the days where the 4th best bowl game was better than the 7th, but now it's just a jumbled mess.

I understand they have a financial interest in this system, but it provided some added resolution to the season.

 

[engie]

I liked the days where the 4th best bowl game was better than the 7th

I think it still is to an extent -- the conference has just been down since the restructuring happened. For instance at traditional strength -- this season -- you have the playoffs for one team. The Sugar for #2. The Cotton and Peach potentially for #3 and #4(think of all the times in the past decade have we had 4-5 teams in the top 15 that would be virtual locks for these bowls). The Citrus for #5. And then you have the sixth level you are talking about.

While it may still be early to make definitive statements on this -- I have not been any more wowed by the Belk and Texas Bowls than I was on the front end when they were announced. I was really hoping to create a couple tie-ins with the Pac12 instead of adding more of the same with the ACC and Big12 teams we basically face all year anyway. I guess we're still fighting over where to play those potential games. Alamodome would have been ideal IMO...

 

[57stratdawg]

Agree they've been underwhelming.

Id be fine with a SEC bowl game in Arizona or California. Look at the Big10, the majority of their bowl games this year in Cali, Tx, and FL this year.

 

[engie]

I think that would have been a good and fair compromise. Just go there for one and have them come here for one. I dunno about San Diego though strictly because of the venue.

 

[hatfieldms]

The bowls are here because of the corporate money...

....and people still watch them. I heard on the radio today that the Indiana/Duke pinstripe bowl last week had higher ratings than the unc/duke basketball game last year. That is why these bowls are it going anywhere. It's all about the dollar

 

[BulldogBlitz]

The idea that the bowls are a reward for worthy teams is an outdated concept. Money is the name of today's game.

Spoiled teams and spoiled fan bases have decided it's outdated.

 

[Dawg1976]

As long as the corporate sponsors aren't losing money they won't cut them back. Somehow their accountants are figuring ways to make it all profitable....advertising, marketing, tax write offs...whatever.

Correct. Plus people don't have to watch them. Just like I don't have to watch some meaningless game during the regular season.

The bowl season may have been considered a reward for the elite teams 25 years ago, but now its just an extension of the regular season with matchups of teams with similar records. And I'm fine with that because I enjoy watching lots of college football. Not all of them, but I will watch a few lower tier games.

 

[Dawgbite]

It's not so much about corporate sponsorship that's driving all these small bowls, it's ESPN. Most if not all of theses bowls are owned by ESPN because it is cheaper to put on a 3-4 hour football game than it is to produce the same amount of original programming. I saw a news piece on this a few years ago and the corporate sponsorship was just gravey on top and cities with football stadiums are standing in line for the next bowl game because it's great visibility for the locals. They don't care about attendance, people actually cost the bowl money due to staff and security. There was even talk of making the small bowls, for TV only, and having no attendance at all. A made for tv event with no fans.

 

[aTotal360]

I'm not buying that at all. It's corporate sponsors. Period. The end. ESPN is just the TV venue. That money would go to another channel and they would host the game if they could win the business from ESPN.

 

[RocketDawg]

The sponsors seem to change every year on a lot of the bowls though. So it may not be all that lucrative for them.

 

[aTotal360]

The "title" sponsor is just a piece of the puzzle. There are dozens of other sponsors that are paying big money for 30 second spots and branded segments.

But to your point, I'm sure being the title sponsor of a bowl game has killed some businesses. One of my clients dumps millions into NASCAR and can't get any measurable return from it. It's like cocaine to the owner of the company. He just wants to be seen.

 

[johnson86-1]

I think it still is to an extent -- the conference has just been down since the restructuring happened. For instance at traditional strength -- this season -- you have the playoffs for one team. The Sugar for #2. The Cotton and Peach potentially for #3 and #4(think of all the times in the past decade have we had 4-5 teams in the top 15 that would be virtual locks for these bowls). The Citrus for #5. And then you have the sixth level you are talking about.

While it may still be early to make definitive statements on this -- I have not been any more wowed by the Belk and Texas Bowls than I was on the front end when they were announced. I was really hoping to create a couple tie-ins with the Pac12 instead of adding more of the same with the ACC and Big12 teams we basically face all year anyway. I guess we're still fighting over where to play those potential games. Alamodome would have been ideal IMO...

The problem is if you're going to have a bowl game where most of your fanbase has to fly, it needs to be a good bowl game. People won't pony up money to fly to watch teams in disappointing seasons. I'm guessing Big 10 teams can get away with it because it gives their fans an excuse to get away from teh weather and I'm also guessing a lot of those teams have better airports to choose from and that the location of those bowls have better airports to fly into.

I think the Belk bowl risks being a disaster attendance wise and it's a hub that offers direct flights from Mississippi and also a pretty reasonable drive from a decent alumni base in Atlanta. If you want SEC fans to fly to san antonio, it better be a good bowl featuring a team with fan base excited about performance on the year. Bowls just don't want to risk that. If the SEC wanted to do a bowl game with the PAC12, it would probably need to set up two, with each one in a place that's easy to fly to. The Peach Bowl would have been a good one for example, but obviously for the peach bowl it made even more sense for them to have an ACC matchup.

 

[johnson86-1]

I'm not buying that at all. It's corporate sponsors. Period. The end. ESPN is just the TV venue. That money would go to another channel and they would host the game if they could win the business from ESPN.

ESPN makes these games possible with TV money, but if anything drives crappy bowls it's every medium size city wanting a bowl game for the tourism dollars and prestige. Shreveport has a bowl because their local people are always out hustling for a sponsor. For the most part, it's not corporations that go around begging to give money to crappy bowls. How many people have you heard lament the fact that we don't have a bowl in Mississippi. If it ever happens, it will be local business people and tourism boards organizing it. ESPN or another network will be required to make it financially viable, but if ESPN was driving the process, every crappy bowl game would be in major or midmajor city or at least a good warm weather tourism destination. I'm actually not sure why there aren't more locations hosting multiple bowls. I think Charlotte is a good location for a bowl, but it seems to me that now that the Peach Bowl isn't an SEC bowl, it would make a lot more sense attendance wise to have a lower tier bowl in Atlanta than in Charlotte. TV revenue would be the same, attendance would be a lot easier for most SEC teams, and the only downside would be the sense that the bowl was second fiddle in its own city, but that doesn't seem like that big of a deal to me. Also seems like we should have a mid tier bowl in New Orleans.

 

[aTotal360]

Not sure if you are agreeing or disagreeing. Shreveport has a bowl game because they have a highly competent bowl committee that is able to get sponsors and because they have the infrastructure to host it. ESPN is able to drum up from additional money from additional corporate sponsors helping everything to run like a well oiled machine. There are dozens of entities that make these things fly.

I guess you don't understand how TV commercials are bought and sold. ESPN and all other TV stations sell commercial spots in 2 different ways. 1) they sell very specific timeslots to specific companies who are looking for a particular viewing demographic. This is the most expensive spot but accounts for a fraction of the total TV revenue. 2) They sell large blocks of advertising to large corporations who loosely agree on ad placement. For example, GMC may pay ESPN $10M for 200 30-second spots to run during the course of the bowl season on the ESPN network of channels. These packages account for a lot of their advertising dollars. And it the big corporations that are making these games sustainable.

Again, ESPN is making it happen because of dollars from corporate sponsors outside of the title sponsors.

 

[patdog]

Id be fine with a SEC bowl game in Arizona or California.

Only SEC bowl games there would be the Rose or Fiesta. Why play a bowl game thousands of miles away when you can make just as much money (more actually) playing one a few hundred miles away? The Big 10 travels so far for its bowls because nobody wants to go to a football game in the Midwest this time of year. High today in the Big 10's home city of Chicago is 35 with snow.

 

[patdog]

I think we see some more FCS programs make the jump to the Sun Belt, Mountain West, MAC, and C-USA over the next few years. Sam Houston St, North Dakota St, Richmond, Montana, Jacksonville St, etc. As power 5 autonomy really comes into play, I think we see a lot of teams make this jump. It's essentially creating a new tier and creating an easier transition, which is still lucrative by those teams' standards.

I think you're probably right about that. Those 4 conferences get a piece of the playoff money and the champion of one of those conferences or the AAC gets a NYD bowl bid. It'll usually be the AAC champ, but if you're in one of those 4 conferences, you've got a legitimate chance.

 

[GhostOfJackie]

The sponsors seem to change every year on a lot of the bowls though. So it may not be all that lucrative for them.

I actually used Taxslayer to do my taxes the year after we played in the Taxslayer Gator Bowl.

 

[BulldogBlitz]

....and there I thought people only claimed doctorates on the interwebs.

**

 

[57stratdawg]

The ACC and Pac12 play every year in El Paso, TX. So, it's perfectly reasonable to ask Miami fans to travel to 1,900 miles to west Texas, but it's unreasonable to ask a LSU fan to travel 1,800 miles to LA? Got it.

Also, Washington traveled 2,100 miles to play Southern Miss in Dallas. You're basically making the "we're the SEC, we don't want to travel" argument even though every other conference left that a long time ago.

 

[engie]

Only SEC bowl games there would be the Rose or Fiesta. Why play a bowl game thousands of miles away when you can make just as much money (more actually) playing one a few hundred miles away? The Big 10 travels so far for its bowls because nobody wants to go to a football game in the Midwest this time of year. High today in the Big 10's home city of Chicago is 35 with snow.

What's the difference between people not going to bowl games in Charlotte vs people not going to bowl games in West Texas/Arizona/Cali? I get the distance thing and that it would probably be fewer people travel -- but it's pretty obvious at this point that attendance at the actual games are an afterthought for many of these bowls -- might as well maximize the TV product. Every time the SEC meets the PAC -- it's a pretty big deal IMO. And people are going to watch it on tv.

 

[Bulldog Bruce]

The one suggestion I have is a Coach Hiring and Recruiting freeze from the end of the regular season to the Championship game. How many teams go to a bowl game with a different coaching staff than they had the whole season? So just do not allow any coach hiring and no recruiting during this time period. That way there is nothing unfair to the schools changing staffs.

 

[johnson86-1]

What's the difference between people not going to bowl games in Charlotte vs people not going to bowl games in West Texas/Arizona/Cali? I get the distance thing and that it would probably be fewer people travel -- but it's pretty obvious at this point that attendance at the actual games are an afterthought for many of these bowls -- might as well maximize the TV product. Every time the SEC meets the PAC -- it's a pretty big deal IMO. And people are going to watch it on tv.

Are people really not going to go to the Belk bowl most years? I get that this year may be bad, but it's a double wammy of being the fan base with probably the 3rd worst location as far as logistics of getting to Charlotte and also getting us on after a disappointing end to the year. I would think Charlotte is a easy enough trip for most SEC fan bases and/or get a team finishing on a higher note that it will have decent attendance. I think putting a bowl in PAC12 territory that has the 7th or 8th draw from the SEC would be much worse. You give the SEC a tie-in with a bowl in PAC12 territory that is the equivalent of the Citrus Bowl, and I think it'd be fine. There'd be some down years when a Bama, LSU, UF, or UGA team coming off a good run "slips" to the Citrus Bowl level, but usually fan bases would be excited for a bowl like that.

 

[HammerOfTheDogs]

IT'S, THE MOST, WONDERFUL TIME, OF THE YEAR....

for degenerate gamblers. Imagine how many guys were sweating out the last seconds of the Heart of Dallas Bowl?

 

[Bane.sixpack]

What really sucks is that the Jackson city leaders cannot agree enough to hold a bowl game in Jackson...!! And even if they did, they could not keep it crime-free! And it is too late now, the college football bubble is getting close to bursting soon.. Jackson should have gotten in on this deal YEARS ago.. but they were too busy dividing and conquering each other

Only way MS ever hosts a bowl game is if it's done in Starkville or Oxford, is that even legal??

 

[DesotoCountyDawg]

I don't understand why it's so terrible to have all these bowls.

1. Its football on tv during a pretty dead part of the sports season.

2. It's a reward for players to travel and experience a bowl game and maybe a chance for people to take a trip to see their team play.

3. It's money for the school and conference.

4. It's extra practice for the younger players to work on getting better.

5. The gifts for the players. Our players are getting 500 dollar gift cards to spend at Belk along with some other things. That's pretty awesome for people who may not have a lot outside of football.

 

[engie]

45,671 last year between Georgia and Louisville. 60.9% full -- or the 10th scarcest stadium in bowl season... We will see how full it is tomorrow.

 

[Arnold Babar.sixpack]

I agree with all of DCD points and others. What's not to like? It's college football, not to mention almost everyday of the week this time of year, and with teams that you don't ever get to watch. I don't give a **** what town it's in or how big the crowds are. If you don't like then don't watch it. Consider it time to get caught up on Murder She Wrote re-runs.

 

[Arnold Babar.sixpack]

The Jackson city leaders couldn't even keep Southwest Airlines flying to Jackson what makes anyone think they could come together to organize a bowl game. They couldn't organize a booger pick off.

 

[was21]

Probably couldn't hold one because of the 17'ng flag