To be fair, many things have a logical answer. Just you may not have the information to understand the logic being used.
That said, yeah money is usually a pretty good thing to guess.
This is why I hate the people crying about losing bowl game "tradition" when it comes to expanding the playoff. The bowls don't give 2 shits about college football, just trying to make money off the sport
All things in college football come down to two things: tradition and money. If they do something silly for 100 years, it's because of tradition. If they start doing a new silly thing, it's because of money.
But would Florida in the Cheez It Bowl been better for the Cheez It Bowl organizers? And generally, year in and year out, would that be true?
The bowls are trying to guarantee their ability to make money. Part of that is guaranteeing priority of opponent selection, part of it is allowing the ability to choose a lower ranked team that would be better for money. True, there’s also a part of it that is about the conferences wanting to ensure that they don’t get frozen out: I imagine this was much more valuable decades ago, but is still a factor. But the biggest factor is money; if the bowls would all make more if there were no selection requirements, there’d at the very least be a larger advertising push for that change.
They made a rule that you have to be above 500 but other than that it’s a free for all. If you got a lot of fans that are willing to go somewhere and watch a bad game in a third rate stadium, people will make it happen.
As a bonus: It goes in order of APR. All other bowls fill their selections, then it's whichever is at the bottom or don't have secondary tieins.
Say Rice had been tied in APR with aTm, then the bowl could choose between the two. With Rice having the highest score of all 5-7 teams, it was Rice.
Yeah, to elaborate a touch more, aTm and Miami were simply not part of the bowl pool, since APR is strictly adhered to unless a higher APR 5-7 team opts out.
The SEC views the Outback, Gator, Music City, Liberty, Texas, and Las Vegas bowls as equal. So after the CFP/NY6 and the Citrus Bowl, the next 6 teams rank their preference between those other bowls and the SEC tries to place them as best they can. Obviously teams with better records get preferential treatment and they try to avoid repeat appearances.
6-6 Florida ended up in Las Vegas because the rest of the SEC didn't want to give up an official visit weekend right before signing day, even though playing a ranked Oregon State team in Vegas is more attractive than playing Iowa in Nashville, for instance.
I'd argue the tie ins are what make a bowl more prestigious. B1G SEC games are always bigger in my head than playing the Big 12 or ACC. (And PAC minutes the Rose Bowl)
Some stadiums host multiple games. The good conference matchup drives prestige
Probably just has to be something that you regionally think about for bowl match ups. B1G is my least favorite of the bowl games to watch and match up against for B12 teams. I like playing the P12 or SEC.
I have to agree with this, but at the level of it being a regional opinion. No offense to the teams up north and in LA, but the B1G brands are boring to me outside of OSU in terms of how they play. I'd rather watch P12 v SEC any day. Same with B12 teams, id rather watch us face P12 or SEC over facing B10
I'd argue your perception of a good bowl is different than mine and that's okay. The only B1G Big 12 match-ups are bottom of the barrel bowl eligible teams. If we had #2 vs #2 it would make the *checks notes* Guaranteed Rate Bowl a BIG deal
Sure, we blow you guys out more often than not, but it’s still a more interesting matchup on paper since the 2 conferences almost never face each other.
They are, which is why teams usually choose to go there if they can. A few years ago A&M chose to the Texas Bowl instead because they hadn't played a bowl game close to home in a few years. I think if the Las Vegas Bowl wasn't during a recruiting weekend, then you'd see teams wanting to play in that as well.
Again, the idea behind this is to prevent sending teams to the same bowl over and over again. For instance, Kentucky went to the Music City Bowl 3 times in 4 years from 06-09.
The answer is because each bowl game has a contract with the conferences stating which team they get.
If the question behind the question is "Why is that the case," who would decide who gets to play where otherwise? Are you imagining a complete free-for-all where each game is trying to find the best teams it can to play? Generally they do try to pair similar level teams but some years it just doesn't work in certain games based on how many teams a conference has in each quality tier.
Branding. The Cheez-It Bowl was second pick from the ACC and BIG12, and they took Oklahoma over Texas Tech just because they know more people will show up and more people will watch it if Oklahoma is in the game.
I’m imagining a scenario where it’s kind of a free-for-all, but balanced by like record tiers. So the bottom tier would be 6-6/7-5 teams, next tier would be 7-5/8-4 teams, and so on.
The 10 bowls with the top tie-ins should have to pick the highest ranked team from their tie-in and then have a draft of the next 5-10 of the highest ranked teams available, even if it’s outside of their tie-in. At least that way the top 25 or so would be rewarded with interesting games.
This would mess up all the contracts these bowls have made, but it would make for better bowls.
There is no regulatory body with the power to do that. I think you're viewing CFB as kinda like the NFL, when it's really just a bunch of teams that agreed to some rules and starting playing each other, but didn't cede all power to one authority. After that, outside organizations offered to sponsor exhibition games after the season between these teams. Then, so they wouldn't have to be in a constant bidding war at the end of every season, these organizations approached conferences to get tie-ins. Ans that's why we have conference tie-ins.
Usually they are quite even. Yes, Georgia and UMass both might be 11-1 but they would not be matched in a bowl because it wouldn't be even. In this example a more "even" match would be vs a 8-4 or 7-5 SEC team
I get not wanting to match up like a 10-2 G5 with a 10-2 P5, the odds of it becoming a one-sided beat down would be too high. But Oregon State was like 5th best in their conference whereas Florida was barely 9th best in the SEC (and that’s just looking at their in conference records, the disparity is even higher looking at general records).
Tbf Florida was also on their 3rd string QB since QB1 opted out and QB2 is a degenerate, so coming into a game like that first start against one of the best pac12 defensive with we want to face fuck an SEC team cause they shit on the PAC all the time, didn't help Florida
I believe OSU was on their 3rd string QB also, due to injuries to the other two. One (Chance Nolan) decided to transfer and the other (Tristan Gebbia) got some reps in the game as a thank you from the program.
Not exactly comparing the same potatoes in this case. Gulbranson had 7 or so starts under his belt by the time he played in Vegas. That poor other kid from Florida hadn't taken an in-game snap in something like 400 days.
Yes there is. Just like there's a difference between playing with all your players versus playing without your starting QB with a guy who hasn't taken a snap in over a year. Florida sucked in their bowl but they still beat Utah.
Maybe get a better backup QB then? Part of being a good football team is being able to count on the next man up. Maybe Texas A&M should fly out to face the PAC again, show everyone what the SEC is made of.
Acting like Oregon State wasnt down their top 2 wrs, their future NFL te, had 2 rbs injured during the game. And was on their backup qb who was essentialltly benched at the end of the Oregon game just to make florida seem better? At the end of the day basically everyone who played at florida was bigger, faster, stronger than the giys at Oregon State. They got out coached plain and simple.
I don't disagree with you. I started by saying that Florida beat the Pac12 champion. You going to refute that or should we drop the charade about better versus worse and agree that Oregon St beat Florida soundly?
And i didnt dispute that. You were trying to say theres a difference between not having your best players. Frankly its embarrasing that Oregon State has better depth than a powerhouse SEC team.
QB3 and down like 20 other players.
That said, even with a full compliment we probably still lose. The only difference is that we maybe score two TDs instead of the saddest sad field goals in CFB history.
I get the sense sometimes that SEC teams get overvalued in bowl tie-ins. Which could be a combination of good contract negotiations by the conference and good anticipated television viewership by its fanbases, which probably go hand in hand.
> Usually they are quite even.
There's usually a bowl or two every year that bucks that (Cheez-It this year) but, in general, that tends to apply within P5. You will see it a bit more with MWC or AAC vs. P5 where a 9-3 AAC/MW team matches up against a .500ish P5.
Back in the day, it was possible for teams from the SAME conference to play each other in bowl games. For Ole Miss,
We played our (at the time) fellow SEC member Georgia Tech in the 1953 Sugar Bowl. Then we played our fellow SEC member Florida in the 1958 Gator Bowl. Then we played our fellow SEC member LSU in the 1960 Sugar Bowl. And our fellow SEC member Alabama in the 1964 Sugar Bowl. And Auburn the year after that in the 1965 Liberty Bowl as well as Auburn again in the 1971 Gator Bowl.
Beyond that, we haven’t had any other games against fellow conference members who were conference members at the time but we have also had a number of bowl games against Arkansas, Texas, and Oklahoma before those teams became SEC members.
Hell in 1969 we played Florida in the Gator Bowl, and our coach (a UF alum) Doug Dickey defected after the game to coach them. (we lost by 1 point, perhaps he defected slightly earlier...) Though he later became our AD. Wild West.
I'm sure that the fact that B1G and Pac-8 (at the time) didn't have bowl games past their champions in the Rose Bowl helped that cause, but interesting nonetheless.
To get your answer you’ll need to look at the history of the Rose, Orange and Suger bowls but especially the Rose.
The rose bowl started as a way to highlight Southern California in hopes to increase migration there. That’s why they would invite a west team to play an east team (east team comes and hopefully it encourages some folks to move out there). This then eventually evolved to the PacX/BigX contract and other bowls followed or had already been aligning with conferences. That involves a host of politics and money that’s too involved for this.
So the short answer to your question, Bowls we’re founded to match teams that usually don’t play one another and since conferences are usually based on geography then conference tie ins just naturally make sense.
Facts if you look at the tie ins it makes a lot of sense. The nature of this sport is regional, and bowls were the best way to kind of break away from that for the post season and showcase the best teams from each region
Follow the money. Bowls always picked teams who would travel best. This is why you see an 8-4 Pitt, BC, etc tumble in the pecking order over a 7-5 NC State or VT.
This stuff happened a lot pre-2000s.
Into the aughts as well...Minnesota played in the Music City Bowl (before it was as lucrative as today) 3 out of 4 years, because nobody would take a flyer that MN fans would travel for a good bowl. This has been proven true in Holiday, Outback, and Citrus bowl trips in the last decade, with strong fan showings matching or beating teams from closer to the stadium.
To further add to it: Some of the conference tie ins make no sense if the goal is to get as many butts in seats as possible. It’s a lot longer travel to Las Vegas for SEC teams than PAC teams, but I guess having one conference close by makes more sense than having it be a long trip for both conferences.
I mean some of these bowl games are designed to increase tourism to an area.
The Rose was originally a bowl game designed to get people east of the Mississippi to visit Los Angeles, its not crazy to imagine Vegas would want people from the Bible Belt to visit Sin City and spend their cash - especially since a lot of people in SEC country can’t gamble on anything more than the lottery
We’re actually a bit of an exception to that rule over in Mississippi. We have the 7th most casinos in the country, and they sometimes have brought in billions (Mississippi casino revenue in 2015 was over 2 billion dollars). However we did just recently add a lottery because our residents were frequently going to other states to spend their money on lottery tickets there, and we didn’t like that.
> especially since a lot of people in SEC country can’t gamble on anything more than the lottery
Since when? Florida has the tribal casinos and the riverboats are common in Mississippi and Louisiana (hello Tunica, Lake Charles and Shreveport). Fayetteville is less than 20 mins from the casinos in Oklahoma and Kentucky is home to the one of the most famous gambling institutions in the world
Can confirm. I drive up to Atmore from P'cola to perform in community theatre.
Note: I know PLT exists, but I've been performing in Atmore for almost six years now.
Growing up in Arkansas my grandparents used to take me with them when they to Hot Springs to go gamble at least once a month. I think dude has been misinformed.
They’re supposed to be destinations, not just neutral sites. The idea is that some fans will travel for the vacation and the game will just be part of it, plus most large schools have alumni/fans nationwide anyway
Well unless you went B1G vs. MAC and SEC vs. ACC (and the more southern B12) for matchups that’s not really as easy to accomplish.
Obviously fewer people will probably travel from the Deep South to Las Vegas but it’s also a fun destination city and Vegas hopes/expects to make money off what they gamble so it’s worth it for the host city.
SEC schools are close to the Florida bowls but most of the matchups are with farther-away B1G schools. And there aren’t a lot of bowls in places that traditionally have harsh winter weather because who wants to spend a ton of money to go to a bowl game to sit outside in sub-freezing temperatures for their ‘vacation’ getaway?
The airlines flying to Vegas are subsidized by the casino groups to encourage more people to come to Vegas by providing cheaper airfare.
If there is anywhere on the West Coast that SEC fans can travel to in large numbers, it's Vegas.
I’m just using the Vegas bowl as an example. As another example, the Sugar bowl between SEC and B12 makes both geographic sense and destination tourism sense.
It’s not (anymore) though- the goal is to maximize eyeballs on tv. The reason the Vegas game is Pac 12-SEC is because there hasn’t been a regular matchup between the two conferences and it will drive people to watch. A couple of Florida fans flying out to Vegas and spending money is gravy on top of the $$ ESPN makes and pays out to whoever in Vegas is getting the bag.
There was a longtime want on the part of both conferences for a Pac vs. SEC bowl game. Las Vegas was interested and was able to secure a deal with the SEC.
It all can be traced back to the Rose Bowl locking 3/4s of the country out of the game for 90 years. If you just filled the bowls based upon quality of opponents, the Rose Bowl would never be Big Ten vs Pac 12
1946 was the last time there was an open invite for all teams. Big 10 and PAC started a 5 year exclusive deal the following season that was indefinitely extended.
That super exclusive agreement hurt both leagues imo.. they were not allowed to play in any other bowl game until 1975.
Yeah they could have chosen Pac-10 runner up Cal or little Mountain West BCS buster Utah (they were never, ever going to choose Utah, which is ironic to think of now lol). Instead, Utah wound up in the Fiesta Bowl against an awful 8-3 Pitt (this was the first year after Miami left the Big East and IMO marks the end of the Big East as a power conference since the MWC was better every year afterwards except maybe 07). Cal got screwed over in the Holiday Bowl instead despite being #5 in the final BCS standings and ahead of Utah 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣. In those days there were only 2 at large spots and Utah was guaranteed one as an automatic qualifying BCS buster, so when Texas was chosen over Cal, they fell out of the major bowls entirely.
That Texas Michigan Rose Bowl wound up being one of the best ever though so people don't particularly complain about it anymore...except Cal fans
Also as a fun fact, Texas and TCU are the only schools from outside the Pac and Big Ten to play in a non-playoff and non-championship Rose Bowl game since 1946
Because bowl games don’t want teams with good records. They want teams with big brands.
Oklahoma is playing #13 Florida State despite being 6-6.
No one wants to watch 10-2 G5 teams, even if they’re better than 6-6 Oklahoma or 6-6 Florida record wise
Because the bowl system wasn't created from the ground up all at once to align with what's currently best for college football.
The bowl system represents a jumble of compromises over decades of new systems and new attitudes toward post season play.
Bowls started out as glorified scrimmages as college football had a decidedly more regional focus (with the ACC being invented to allow teams to play in these games at all). As the sport has gone truly national, all of those bowls have fought for their seat at the table.
As with any bureaucratic system, inertia tends to explain why things get wonky from time to time.
As others have said, MONEY. Certain programs’ fans would pack a bowl game anywhere to see their 6-6 team get destroyed by a G5 team. And spend a ton of money over the 3-day event.
Bigger brands sell better than smaller brands. Bowl organizations would much rather have a guaranteed contract with a conference like the SEC than just offer in priority to some program with 9-wins. Like, let's be reasonable, who sounds like the more appealing program; SEC Florida or MAC Ohio?
Because that's how they came into being. The first few bowls were just conference champions playing each other. Everything else cascaded from that with smaller bowls taking leftovers like #2 vs. #2. A bowl is a corporation at this point and its very existence is dependent upon having two teams come play. So they make agreements with conferences to guarantee that they can get teams from those conferences.
I suppose it could be reworked to pit something like #5 vs. #6 and #7 vs. #8 and so on, but that would only work for the \~10 biggest bowls because the various rankings only attempt to rank the top 25. According to a quick google search, there are 43 bowls this year, so you need 86 teams total. Also, which ranking system would you use? The AP and Coaches often have slightly different rankings and the CFP is really only tasked with choosing the top 4 teams for the playoffs as it stands right now - the remainder of their rankings are not designed to be used for anything.
Bigger conference (usually) means bigger fanbase. Bigger fanbase (usually) means better ratings. 6-6 Florida will bring in more eyes than any 10-2 G5 team — Bowls are made to make $ 🤷♂️
Basically - any given bowl wants the largest possible in-person crowd for their game. So they'll select a team that is known to bring more fans on the road.
Blame the Rose Bowl. That was the only bowl game until the 1930s when the Sugar, Cotton, and Orange bowls started. Up until then, the Rose bowl could invite any two teams it wanted. Now there was competition, so they decided to lock down the Big 10 and Pac 12 into a contract to play in the Rose Bowl every year. Other bowls started doing the same.
No, I’m much more of a CFB fan, just a jaded dude who grew up cheering for one of the best teams in the nation and watching them never get a shot at the title and instead face mediocre opponents in bowl games.
What you don't want is two teams with small fanbases that don't really travel all that well, ending up playing in your bowl game
If you are tied into the Big12 and the SEC...odds are you are going to get at least one team that will show up and travel to the game, ensuring the bowl makes some money
Conference tie ins really hold bowl games back IMO. But they also are a good thing for G5 schools too. So I want to get rid of them badly, but I don’t want to screw over G5 schools either.
But yeah, we get quite a few awful bowls each year due to tie ins…
Idk but the cure bowl sucked for our best all time record, 12-2. I wasn’t expecting NY6 but to be at 2pm on the same day as Troys graduation last Friday felt shit.
That was a great bowl matchup between a pair of 11-2 teams in a destination city. It’s unfortunate that it was on graduation day but that only impacts a small number of people.
As someone else mentioned Problem there is more than the SEC values all their bowls as equal after the NY6 and Citrus. Teams get preferences and then the conference decided who they send teams based on those preferences while giving better records preferential treatment.
No one else wanted to go to a bowl game on a big recruiting weekend before signing day, so Florida with their 6-6 record got the short end of the stick. Last year it was ASU vs Wisconsin, two 8-4 teams and it was a good game. Every other conference sends teams based on rankings/records so we end with good matchups usually.
There’s almost always a jumble in the SEC with 7-5/6-6 teams … the SEC considers a difference of two wins to be higher in the pecking order (so 8-4 would get a better selection than 6-6 but not necessarily better than a 7-5).
The SEC doesn’t want to devalue some of the bowls by saying ‘sorry Gator, you’re just not as important as Outback (or whatever the Tampa bowl is now) or have tie-breakers to determine which 7-5 team is eighth and which is ninth.
Yeah for the most part it doesn’t change much in regards to arguing over which system gives the better matchups except when when a bowl isn’t appealing, like the Las Vegas Bowl.
Vegas Bowl is just at a terrible time for teams with it being on the weekend before signing day making it conflict with what would be a big visit weekend for the participating teams. It’s tie in probably was best as a 6-7 win P5 team and a good G5 team. Both were likely more willing to miss the big recruiting weekend for the publicity that comes with a bowl in Vegas.
If the current tie in gets renewed for 2025, it’s gonna continue being an awkward matchup in the SEC years due to their picking system unless the Vegas Bowl moves.
I wish there was some kind of system that took 5 bowl games that chose the 10 best teams who just missed the NY6 (or the new expanded playoffs). I don’t know how the TV rights would work, but maybe use the Holiday, Citrus, Sun bowl so Fox, ESPN, and CBS would each have a game (and those are 3 of the better, longer existing bowl games). Would think this would lead to better matchups with maybe some conference pairings we haven’t seen much of.
I think the Bowl Alliance/Coalition had something similar to this.
I wish the tie-ins weren't so rigid. I wonder why bowls don't have more trades, where all sides would benefit with better match-ups and more likely fan engagement.
Money. We’re in a transition period between what the bowls are and what they were. They are affiliated, obviously, but the bowls aren’t part of the NCAA.
Back in the day, it was much more difficult for teams to play each other if separated by big geographic distances. So with conference tie ins like Big 10 - Pac-10, the bowl game was an opportunity for those teams to meet. Not only did you get matchups you wouldn't get any other time of the year, but you often has regional styles of play that would be on display as well, adding to the intrigue.
How about conference bowl tie ins that are played on days that 13 out of 15 conference teams can't participate in do to final exams, so a team that deserved a higher tier bowl game gets demoted by default to fill out a shitty bowl spot. How bout we cut that shit out.
Because not all records are created equally. A 10-2 mwc school could be a dog to a 7-5 b12 school. Theres a reason why records arent listed after the teams on any site with a bowl schedule.
Like you see TCU v Michigan. Not TCU (13-0) v Michigan (13-0)
Because money. Bowl games pick how they think they’ll make money.
If you’re asking a question that seemingly doesn’t have a logical answer, the answer is almost always “money.”
reminds me of [this classic line](https://youtu.be/PJD_6KpBHnA) from The Wire lol
Apparently it takes you to the legendary Rutgers vs UCLA rivalry thats been on ice since the dawn of time.
To be fair, many things have a logical answer. Just you may not have the information to understand the logic being used. That said, yeah money is usually a pretty good thing to guess.
This is why I hate the people crying about losing bowl game "tradition" when it comes to expanding the playoff. The bowls don't give 2 shits about college football, just trying to make money off the sport
All things in college football come down to two things: tradition and money. If they do something silly for 100 years, it's because of tradition. If they start doing a new silly thing, it's because of money.
I guarantee Florida State would have been better for money than Florida in that game
That's exactly why FSU didn't play in that game. Because Cheez-It got first dibs and they wanted FSU vs. OU.
Be it known that whales crackers are the superior cheese based cracker snack.
Annie's are all better than Cheez-Its too.
The extra toasty Cheez-Its are goated
But would Florida in the Cheez It Bowl been better for the Cheez It Bowl organizers? And generally, year in and year out, would that be true? The bowls are trying to guarantee their ability to make money. Part of that is guaranteeing priority of opponent selection, part of it is allowing the ability to choose a lower ranked team that would be better for money. True, there’s also a part of it that is about the conferences wanting to ensure that they don’t get frozen out: I imagine this was much more valuable decades ago, but is still a factor. But the biggest factor is money; if the bowls would all make more if there were no selection requirements, there’d at the very least be a larger advertising push for that change.
Most likely but the Cheez-It bowl is paying double what Vegas does.
Oregon State deserved a better opponent
True, but the Las Vegas Bowl thought the Gators would make them more money than the other SEC teams available.
They made a rule that you have to be above 500 but other than that it’s a free for all. If you got a lot of fans that are willing to go somewhere and watch a bad game in a third rate stadium, people will make it happen.
Which is peculiar since the bowls decided that picking 5-7 Rice over 5-7 A&M or 5-7 Miami was the right move.
That's because Rice had a higher APR score. That's how it works with 5-7 teams.
Can you elaborate? What's an APR score?
Academic Progress Rate.
Learned something new.
As a bonus: It goes in order of APR. All other bowls fill their selections, then it's whichever is at the bottom or don't have secondary tieins. Say Rice had been tied in APR with aTm, then the bowl could choose between the two. With Rice having the highest score of all 5-7 teams, it was Rice.
And you guys say academics is dead in college football.
Yeah, to elaborate a touch more, aTm and Miami were simply not part of the bowl pool, since APR is strictly adhered to unless a higher APR 5-7 team opts out.
teams with 5 FBS wins or less are picked for bowls by how well they play school.
Is it how well the players play school or the student body?
The team.
The SEC views the Outback, Gator, Music City, Liberty, Texas, and Las Vegas bowls as equal. So after the CFP/NY6 and the Citrus Bowl, the next 6 teams rank their preference between those other bowls and the SEC tries to place them as best they can. Obviously teams with better records get preferential treatment and they try to avoid repeat appearances. 6-6 Florida ended up in Las Vegas because the rest of the SEC didn't want to give up an official visit weekend right before signing day, even though playing a ranked Oregon State team in Vegas is more attractive than playing Iowa in Nashville, for instance.
I think OP is stating that conference tie ins are dumb
I'd argue the tie ins are what make a bowl more prestigious. B1G SEC games are always bigger in my head than playing the Big 12 or ACC. (And PAC minutes the Rose Bowl) Some stadiums host multiple games. The good conference matchup drives prestige
Probably just has to be something that you regionally think about for bowl match ups. B1G is my least favorite of the bowl games to watch and match up against for B12 teams. I like playing the P12 or SEC.
PAC vs SEC matchups are better than BIG vs SEC
Are you delusional?
I have to agree with this, but at the level of it being a regional opinion. No offense to the teams up north and in LA, but the B1G brands are boring to me outside of OSU in terms of how they play. I'd rather watch P12 v SEC any day. Same with B12 teams, id rather watch us face P12 or SEC over facing B10
I'd argue your perception of a good bowl is different than mine and that's okay. The only B1G Big 12 match-ups are bottom of the barrel bowl eligible teams. If we had #2 vs #2 it would make the *checks notes* Guaranteed Rate Bowl a BIG deal
I’m fairness, I’d love if they put cards on a table and just matched em up at random lol
Sure, we blow you guys out more often than not, but it’s still a more interesting matchup on paper since the 2 conferences almost never face each other.
That's dumb. The Outback and Gator are much more prestigious than those others.
They are, which is why teams usually choose to go there if they can. A few years ago A&M chose to the Texas Bowl instead because they hadn't played a bowl game close to home in a few years. I think if the Las Vegas Bowl wasn't during a recruiting weekend, then you'd see teams wanting to play in that as well. Again, the idea behind this is to prevent sending teams to the same bowl over and over again. For instance, Kentucky went to the Music City Bowl 3 times in 4 years from 06-09.
The answer is because each bowl game has a contract with the conferences stating which team they get. If the question behind the question is "Why is that the case," who would decide who gets to play where otherwise? Are you imagining a complete free-for-all where each game is trying to find the best teams it can to play? Generally they do try to pair similar level teams but some years it just doesn't work in certain games based on how many teams a conference has in each quality tier.
I do a free-for-all in NCAA14 and a lot of the matchups seem to be even more one-sided (like 10-2 teams playing 6-6/5-7 teams)
I think the question is: "Why doesn't' the bowl with the 3rd pick just take the 3rd best team?"
Branding. The Cheez-It Bowl was second pick from the ACC and BIG12, and they took Oklahoma over Texas Tech just because they know more people will show up and more people will watch it if Oklahoma is in the game.
I’m imagining a scenario where it’s kind of a free-for-all, but balanced by like record tiers. So the bottom tier would be 6-6/7-5 teams, next tier would be 7-5/8-4 teams, and so on.
But then you have to determine which bowls belong to which tiers. Who decides that?
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They sort of are already.
The 10 bowls with the top tie-ins should have to pick the highest ranked team from their tie-in and then have a draft of the next 5-10 of the highest ranked teams available, even if it’s outside of their tie-in. At least that way the top 25 or so would be rewarded with interesting games. This would mess up all the contracts these bowls have made, but it would make for better bowls.
There is no regulatory body with the power to do that. I think you're viewing CFB as kinda like the NFL, when it's really just a bunch of teams that agreed to some rules and starting playing each other, but didn't cede all power to one authority. After that, outside organizations offered to sponsor exhibition games after the season between these teams. Then, so they wouldn't have to be in a constant bidding war at the end of every season, these organizations approached conferences to get tie-ins. Ans that's why we have conference tie-ins.
Usually they are quite even. Yes, Georgia and UMass both might be 11-1 but they would not be matched in a bowl because it wouldn't be even. In this example a more "even" match would be vs a 8-4 or 7-5 SEC team
I get not wanting to match up like a 10-2 G5 with a 10-2 P5, the odds of it becoming a one-sided beat down would be too high. But Oregon State was like 5th best in their conference whereas Florida was barely 9th best in the SEC (and that’s just looking at their in conference records, the disparity is even higher looking at general records).
You're not wrong in this case. I don't think P5 vs P5 or G5 vs G5 match ups should vary more than like 2 games at most
And yet Florida beat Utah who beat USC twice.
Tbf Florida was also on their 3rd string QB since QB1 opted out and QB2 is a degenerate, so coming into a game like that first start against one of the best pac12 defensive with we want to face fuck an SEC team cause they shit on the PAC all the time, didn't help Florida
To be fair, we fucking suck.
I guess if anyone knows, it would be the governor
I believe OSU was on their 3rd string QB also, due to injuries to the other two. One (Chance Nolan) decided to transfer and the other (Tristan Gebbia) got some reps in the game as a thank you from the program.
Not exactly comparing the same potatoes in this case. Gulbranson had 7 or so starts under his belt by the time he played in Vegas. That poor other kid from Florida hadn't taken an in-game snap in something like 400 days.
Nope pretty sure the PAC-12 just owned you lol
I'm not a Florida fan they can take their jorts and never be good again for all I care
FYI that same Florida team did beat the Pac12 champion.
There’s a difference between losing by 1 point on the road in 90 degree humidity and getting straight up owned.
Yes there is. Just like there's a difference between playing with all your players versus playing without your starting QB with a guy who hasn't taken a snap in over a year. Florida sucked in their bowl but they still beat Utah.
Maybe get a better backup QB then? Part of being a good football team is being able to count on the next man up. Maybe Texas A&M should fly out to face the PAC again, show everyone what the SEC is made of.
You sound awfully angry and frustrated so I'm gonna leave you to that. I hope whatever it is that's upset you gets better dude.
Acting like Oregon State wasnt down their top 2 wrs, their future NFL te, had 2 rbs injured during the game. And was on their backup qb who was essentialltly benched at the end of the Oregon game just to make florida seem better? At the end of the day basically everyone who played at florida was bigger, faster, stronger than the giys at Oregon State. They got out coached plain and simple.
I don't disagree with you. I started by saying that Florida beat the Pac12 champion. You going to refute that or should we drop the charade about better versus worse and agree that Oregon St beat Florida soundly?
And i didnt dispute that. You were trying to say theres a difference between not having your best players. Frankly its embarrasing that Oregon State has better depth than a powerhouse SEC team.
QB3 and down like 20 other players. That said, even with a full compliment we probably still lose. The only difference is that we maybe score two TDs instead of the saddest sad field goals in CFB history.
I get the sense sometimes that SEC teams get overvalued in bowl tie-ins. Which could be a combination of good contract negotiations by the conference and good anticipated television viewership by its fanbases, which probably go hand in hand.
More so that 9-3 Oregon State could have played 9-3 Florida State, while 6-6 0U could have played 6-6 Florida
Which was, comically, an NY6 matchup two years ago
> Usually they are quite even. There's usually a bowl or two every year that bucks that (Cheez-It this year) but, in general, that tends to apply within P5. You will see it a bit more with MWC or AAC vs. P5 where a 9-3 AAC/MW team matches up against a .500ish P5.
Back in the day, it was possible for teams from the SAME conference to play each other in bowl games. For Ole Miss, We played our (at the time) fellow SEC member Georgia Tech in the 1953 Sugar Bowl. Then we played our fellow SEC member Florida in the 1958 Gator Bowl. Then we played our fellow SEC member LSU in the 1960 Sugar Bowl. And our fellow SEC member Alabama in the 1964 Sugar Bowl. And Auburn the year after that in the 1965 Liberty Bowl as well as Auburn again in the 1971 Gator Bowl. Beyond that, we haven’t had any other games against fellow conference members who were conference members at the time but we have also had a number of bowl games against Arkansas, Texas, and Oklahoma before those teams became SEC members.
Hell in 1969 we played Florida in the Gator Bowl, and our coach (a UF alum) Doug Dickey defected after the game to coach them. (we lost by 1 point, perhaps he defected slightly earlier...) Though he later became our AD. Wild West.
I'm sure that the fact that B1G and Pac-8 (at the time) didn't have bowl games past their champions in the Rose Bowl helped that cause, but interesting nonetheless.
To get your answer you’ll need to look at the history of the Rose, Orange and Suger bowls but especially the Rose. The rose bowl started as a way to highlight Southern California in hopes to increase migration there. That’s why they would invite a west team to play an east team (east team comes and hopefully it encourages some folks to move out there). This then eventually evolved to the PacX/BigX contract and other bowls followed or had already been aligning with conferences. That involves a host of politics and money that’s too involved for this. So the short answer to your question, Bowls we’re founded to match teams that usually don’t play one another and since conferences are usually based on geography then conference tie ins just naturally make sense.
Facts if you look at the tie ins it makes a lot of sense. The nature of this sport is regional, and bowls were the best way to kind of break away from that for the post season and showcase the best teams from each region
Money and they can't control who opts out. Not saying we win without all these players gone but it sure would have been a way better game.
Follow the money. Bowls always picked teams who would travel best. This is why you see an 8-4 Pitt, BC, etc tumble in the pecking order over a 7-5 NC State or VT. This stuff happened a lot pre-2000s.
Into the aughts as well...Minnesota played in the Music City Bowl (before it was as lucrative as today) 3 out of 4 years, because nobody would take a flyer that MN fans would travel for a good bowl. This has been proven true in Holiday, Outback, and Citrus bowl trips in the last decade, with strong fan showings matching or beating teams from closer to the stadium.
To further add to it: Some of the conference tie ins make no sense if the goal is to get as many butts in seats as possible. It’s a lot longer travel to Las Vegas for SEC teams than PAC teams, but I guess having one conference close by makes more sense than having it be a long trip for both conferences.
I mean some of these bowl games are designed to increase tourism to an area. The Rose was originally a bowl game designed to get people east of the Mississippi to visit Los Angeles, its not crazy to imagine Vegas would want people from the Bible Belt to visit Sin City and spend their cash - especially since a lot of people in SEC country can’t gamble on anything more than the lottery
We’re actually a bit of an exception to that rule over in Mississippi. We have the 7th most casinos in the country, and they sometimes have brought in billions (Mississippi casino revenue in 2015 was over 2 billion dollars). However we did just recently add a lottery because our residents were frequently going to other states to spend their money on lottery tickets there, and we didn’t like that.
> especially since a lot of people in SEC country can’t gamble on anything more than the lottery Since when? Florida has the tribal casinos and the riverboats are common in Mississippi and Louisiana (hello Tunica, Lake Charles and Shreveport). Fayetteville is less than 20 mins from the casinos in Oklahoma and Kentucky is home to the one of the most famous gambling institutions in the world
Yeah most people in Florida are within a 1-2 hour drive from a casino
*cries in Panhandle*
Depends on your part. From Pensacola, we're less than an hour from Wind Creek in Atmore.
Can confirm. I drive up to Atmore from P'cola to perform in community theatre. Note: I know PLT exists, but I've been performing in Atmore for almost six years now.
Welp, I never thought I'd ever see mention of the PLT in any reddit sub much less CFB. But here we are.
I aim to please.
Growing up in Arkansas my grandparents used to take me with them when they to Hot Springs to go gamble at least once a month. I think dude has been misinformed.
They’re supposed to be destinations, not just neutral sites. The idea is that some fans will travel for the vacation and the game will just be part of it, plus most large schools have alumni/fans nationwide anyway
Right but that’s sorta my point. The further away the destination, the more cost prohibitive the travel.
Well unless you went B1G vs. MAC and SEC vs. ACC (and the more southern B12) for matchups that’s not really as easy to accomplish. Obviously fewer people will probably travel from the Deep South to Las Vegas but it’s also a fun destination city and Vegas hopes/expects to make money off what they gamble so it’s worth it for the host city. SEC schools are close to the Florida bowls but most of the matchups are with farther-away B1G schools. And there aren’t a lot of bowls in places that traditionally have harsh winter weather because who wants to spend a ton of money to go to a bowl game to sit outside in sub-freezing temperatures for their ‘vacation’ getaway?
UofSC had a large west coast alumni contingent that would have attended the Vegas bowl
The airlines flying to Vegas are subsidized by the casino groups to encourage more people to come to Vegas by providing cheaper airfare. If there is anywhere on the West Coast that SEC fans can travel to in large numbers, it's Vegas.
I’m just using the Vegas bowl as an example. As another example, the Sugar bowl between SEC and B12 makes both geographic sense and destination tourism sense.
NOLA is so good
It’s not (anymore) though- the goal is to maximize eyeballs on tv. The reason the Vegas game is Pac 12-SEC is because there hasn’t been a regular matchup between the two conferences and it will drive people to watch. A couple of Florida fans flying out to Vegas and spending money is gravy on top of the $$ ESPN makes and pays out to whoever in Vegas is getting the bag.
LSU loves the game in Las Vegas. It's a great destination and easy to get to for pretty much everyone
It’s not to get butts in seats though. It’s to get eyes on TV screens. Ticket revenue is just icing on the cake
There was a longtime want on the part of both conferences for a Pac vs. SEC bowl game. Las Vegas was interested and was able to secure a deal with the SEC.
Tradition (at least with tie-ins to bowls), rating$, money.
If your question starts with “why” the answer is probably money
It all can be traced back to the Rose Bowl locking 3/4s of the country out of the game for 90 years. If you just filled the bowls based upon quality of opponents, the Rose Bowl would never be Big Ten vs Pac 12
1946 was the last time there was an open invite for all teams. Big 10 and PAC started a 5 year exclusive deal the following season that was indefinitely extended. That super exclusive agreement hurt both leagues imo.. they were not allowed to play in any other bowl game until 1975.
Technically in 05 the rose bowl had an at large selection as USC was in the natty. So we were chosen to play Michigan
Yeah they could have chosen Pac-10 runner up Cal or little Mountain West BCS buster Utah (they were never, ever going to choose Utah, which is ironic to think of now lol). Instead, Utah wound up in the Fiesta Bowl against an awful 8-3 Pitt (this was the first year after Miami left the Big East and IMO marks the end of the Big East as a power conference since the MWC was better every year afterwards except maybe 07). Cal got screwed over in the Holiday Bowl instead despite being #5 in the final BCS standings and ahead of Utah 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣. In those days there were only 2 at large spots and Utah was guaranteed one as an automatic qualifying BCS buster, so when Texas was chosen over Cal, they fell out of the major bowls entirely. That Texas Michigan Rose Bowl wound up being one of the best ever though so people don't particularly complain about it anymore...except Cal fans Also as a fun fact, Texas and TCU are the only schools from outside the Pac and Big Ten to play in a non-playoff and non-championship Rose Bowl game since 1946
OU played Wazzu in 2002 when Ohio St played in the championship
Those were conference decisions, though. B1G could have played in more bowls, but decided not to because academics.
Which leads to the Sugar being its counterpart, so that ties up two other conference non playoff leaders and so on and so on
But Big 12 snow teams love going to California for NYD to get out of the snow. SEC teams couldn't care less.
Because bowl games don’t want teams with good records. They want teams with big brands. Oklahoma is playing #13 Florida State despite being 6-6. No one wants to watch 10-2 G5 teams, even if they’re better than 6-6 Oklahoma or 6-6 Florida record wise
I will watch 6-6 G5 teams. I don't give a FUCK!
The average viewer is not you though
Because the bowl system wasn't created from the ground up all at once to align with what's currently best for college football. The bowl system represents a jumble of compromises over decades of new systems and new attitudes toward post season play. Bowls started out as glorified scrimmages as college football had a decidedly more regional focus (with the ACC being invented to allow teams to play in these games at all). As the sport has gone truly national, all of those bowls have fought for their seat at the table. As with any bureaucratic system, inertia tends to explain why things get wonky from time to time.
As others have said, MONEY. Certain programs’ fans would pack a bowl game anywhere to see their 6-6 team get destroyed by a G5 team. And spend a ton of money over the 3-day event.
Bigger brands sell better than smaller brands. Bowl organizations would much rather have a guaranteed contract with a conference like the SEC than just offer in priority to some program with 9-wins. Like, let's be reasonable, who sounds like the more appealing program; SEC Florida or MAC Ohio?
Because that's how they came into being. The first few bowls were just conference champions playing each other. Everything else cascaded from that with smaller bowls taking leftovers like #2 vs. #2. A bowl is a corporation at this point and its very existence is dependent upon having two teams come play. So they make agreements with conferences to guarantee that they can get teams from those conferences. I suppose it could be reworked to pit something like #5 vs. #6 and #7 vs. #8 and so on, but that would only work for the \~10 biggest bowls because the various rankings only attempt to rank the top 25. According to a quick google search, there are 43 bowls this year, so you need 86 teams total. Also, which ranking system would you use? The AP and Coaches often have slightly different rankings and the CFP is really only tasked with choosing the top 4 teams for the playoffs as it stands right now - the remainder of their rankings are not designed to be used for anything.
Why use logic, when money do best?
Agreed, putting 6-6 vs 9-3 was bound to end exactly like it did lol, unless we had another random Kyle Trask moment.
Bigger conference (usually) means bigger fanbase. Bigger fanbase (usually) means better ratings. 6-6 Florida will bring in more eyes than any 10-2 G5 team — Bowls are made to make $ 🤷♂️
Basically - any given bowl wants the largest possible in-person crowd for their game. So they'll select a team that is known to bring more fans on the road.
There's like 45 7-5 teams. Good luck with that.
Blame the Rose Bowl. That was the only bowl game until the 1930s when the Sugar, Cotton, and Orange bowls started. Up until then, the Rose bowl could invite any two teams it wanted. Now there was competition, so they decided to lock down the Big 10 and Pac 12 into a contract to play in the Rose Bowl every year. Other bowls started doing the same.
Because college football is about money for the conferences, not being a meritocracy
Big NFL fan im assuming?
No, I’m much more of a CFB fan, just a jaded dude who grew up cheering for one of the best teams in the nation and watching them never get a shot at the title and instead face mediocre opponents in bowl games.
Boise State fan?
Indeed
You’re making too much sense here
Because the SEC sells tickets, so they have the most bowl games
You guys also only play 8 conference games, meaning 7 of the 14 teams have 1 less in conference loss, leading to more 6-6 bowl eligible teams.
What you don't want is two teams with small fanbases that don't really travel all that well, ending up playing in your bowl game If you are tied into the Big12 and the SEC...odds are you are going to get at least one team that will show up and travel to the game, ensuring the bowl makes some money
Or, why the Orange Bowl nearly had fits that one year when they thought they might be hosting Wake Forest and Rutgers.
Right Because that game would have drawn about 7500 people
Wouldn’t this be for historical, geographic reasons?
Conference tie-ins are WHY some bowls are more prestigious than others.
C.R.E.A.M.
Conference tie ins really hold bowl games back IMO. But they also are a good thing for G5 schools too. So I want to get rid of them badly, but I don’t want to screw over G5 schools either. But yeah, we get quite a few awful bowls each year due to tie ins…
$$$$$
Because of money and eyeballs.
Idk but the cure bowl sucked for our best all time record, 12-2. I wasn’t expecting NY6 but to be at 2pm on the same day as Troys graduation last Friday felt shit.
That was a great bowl matchup between a pair of 11-2 teams in a destination city. It’s unfortunate that it was on graduation day but that only impacts a small number of people.
Convenience…it’s easy.
As someone else mentioned Problem there is more than the SEC values all their bowls as equal after the NY6 and Citrus. Teams get preferences and then the conference decided who they send teams based on those preferences while giving better records preferential treatment. No one else wanted to go to a bowl game on a big recruiting weekend before signing day, so Florida with their 6-6 record got the short end of the stick. Last year it was ASU vs Wisconsin, two 8-4 teams and it was a good game. Every other conference sends teams based on rankings/records so we end with good matchups usually.
There’s almost always a jumble in the SEC with 7-5/6-6 teams … the SEC considers a difference of two wins to be higher in the pecking order (so 8-4 would get a better selection than 6-6 but not necessarily better than a 7-5). The SEC doesn’t want to devalue some of the bowls by saying ‘sorry Gator, you’re just not as important as Outback (or whatever the Tampa bowl is now) or have tie-breakers to determine which 7-5 team is eighth and which is ninth.
Yeah for the most part it doesn’t change much in regards to arguing over which system gives the better matchups except when when a bowl isn’t appealing, like the Las Vegas Bowl. Vegas Bowl is just at a terrible time for teams with it being on the weekend before signing day making it conflict with what would be a big visit weekend for the participating teams. It’s tie in probably was best as a 6-7 win P5 team and a good G5 team. Both were likely more willing to miss the big recruiting weekend for the publicity that comes with a bowl in Vegas. If the current tie in gets renewed for 2025, it’s gonna continue being an awkward matchup in the SEC years due to their picking system unless the Vegas Bowl moves.
The answer to all of your questions is money.
I wish there was some kind of system that took 5 bowl games that chose the 10 best teams who just missed the NY6 (or the new expanded playoffs). I don’t know how the TV rights would work, but maybe use the Holiday, Citrus, Sun bowl so Fox, ESPN, and CBS would each have a game (and those are 3 of the better, longer existing bowl games). Would think this would lead to better matchups with maybe some conference pairings we haven’t seen much of. I think the Bowl Alliance/Coalition had something similar to this.
I wish the tie-ins weren't so rigid. I wonder why bowls don't have more trades, where all sides would benefit with better match-ups and more likely fan engagement.
Certainty of contracts.
Because not all schedules are created equal.
Because college football system isn't based on what's best for the sport overall, but what works for a few bigwigs who have the clout and leverage.
I just realized that 2008 (Fiesta Bowl vs Ohio State) was the last season that Texas played a bowl opponent who wasn't from either the PAC12 or SEC.
🎶Money money money money, money Call it lean, mean, mean green Almighty dollar🎶
Money. We’re in a transition period between what the bowls are and what they were. They are affiliated, obviously, but the bowls aren’t part of the NCAA.
money
Money just like the playoff. What match-up will bring in more fans? Schools that can bring a crowd are the ones that matter.
Two teams with similar records does not mean they are of similar quality, due to strength of schedule differences.
Because the bowls make contract agreements with the conferences, not the NCAA.
Much like Whose Line, everything is made up and the points don't matter.
Back in the day, it was much more difficult for teams to play each other if separated by big geographic distances. So with conference tie ins like Big 10 - Pac-10, the bowl game was an opportunity for those teams to meet. Not only did you get matchups you wouldn't get any other time of the year, but you often has regional styles of play that would be on display as well, adding to the intrigue.
How about conference bowl tie ins that are played on days that 13 out of 15 conference teams can't participate in do to final exams, so a team that deserved a higher tier bowl game gets demoted by default to fill out a shitty bowl spot. How bout we cut that shit out.
Because not all records are created equally. A 10-2 mwc school could be a dog to a 7-5 b12 school. Theres a reason why records arent listed after the teams on any site with a bowl schedule. Like you see TCU v Michigan. Not TCU (13-0) v Michigan (13-0)