There Too Many Bowls

The college football season is over and now we are onto the bowl season. There will be 34 post season games to reward collegiate teams for having good seasons. The problem is there were not 68 teams that had good seasons. There are rarely going to be that many good schools considering that there are only 120 FBS schools to begin with. That means more than half the teams playing will get to go to postseason. The fact of the matter is that we have too many bowl games.

Part of the problem is that when Division scheduled for FBS schools went from 11 to 12 games it allowed more opportunity for teams to become bowl eligible. Under the 11 game format teams that won at least 6 games qualified to play in a postseason game. That 6 game requirement was never adjusted when the schedule expanded which made it easier for teams to get in. One problem with that this is that there is no requirement that those 6 wins have to come against FBS schools. So a team that gets 2 quick victories against St Joes School for the Blind and Bozo The Clown State now only has to get by 4 out of the next 10 games.

The sight of some of these sad games is very unappealing. Looking at those empty stadiums is not a good sight only to see 2 mediocre teams play. The fans are not that interested in the lower tier bowl games because they are usually in some horrible locations. For instance this year Georgia Tech will be playing in the Music City Bowl in Nashville, TN. Now I don’t know how many alumni are interested in spending December 30th in Nashville. It’s not like it’s a warmer city then their hometown of Atlanta and doesn’t provide any real motivation for the out of town alums to travel. Not mention I am pretty sure the people of Nashville are breaking their necks to see two schools that they have no connection to play each other.

Maybe after we bring in the playoff system maybe we can wash out some of these irrelevant games. Until then enjoy that GoDaddy.com Bowl matchup of Ball State and Arkansas State. If you want to go I am sure there will plenty of 10 dollar tickets floating around Mobile, AL.

Keith B. Holt

Follow on Twitter @Kholtjr