The Football Bowl Association

I was watching the San Diego County Credit Union Poinsettia Bowl and the Football Bowl Association was running ads. What? Really? Their slogan was “College Bowl Games: Where everybody wins.” Yeah, if by everybody you mean everybody except the fans, the NCAA, the players, the teams… if by everybody you mean nobody, then yes, everybody wins.

It was particularly sad and ironic to be watching those ads in the midst of a wonderful game between #9 Boise State and #11 TCU. Two teams who outrank BOTH teams who will play in the BCS Fedex Orange Bowl(namely #12 Cincinatti who makes it in thanks to the BCS’s ridiculously outdated affiliation with the Big East Conference and #21 Virginia Tech who won the woeful ACC this year). Two teams who would both be playing in any sort of sanely organized College Football Tournament. A game which is the very embodiment of the failure of the current system.

Would anyone watching at home, or even in the stadium really, seriously rather be watching them waste a nail-biting 17-16 game in the meaningless San Diego County Credit Union Poinsettia Bowl than watching them play on their home turf in the second round of a tournament? Really? Do you think you’re cheap-ass TV ad is really going to snow people over into thinking the Bowls really are better?

And more importantly is there any reason why you couldn’t still have a meaningless Poinsettia Bowl running concurrently with a College Football Tournament? No. There isn’t. It wouldn’t feature #9 Boise State and #11 TCU, but that’s as it should be.