For years, one of college football’s most popular offseason experiments is answering a question that’s lingered since the inception of the four-team playoff: What happens to bowl games?
That conversation has accelerated given the expansion to a 12-team playoff and the likely eventual growth to at least 16 teams.
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Do the bowls shift to September as season-opening neutral-site games? Are they all eliminated completely? Are they incorporated into a bigger playoff field?
College football enters its most dramatic offseason in the modern history of bowl games. A revolutionary change to the bowl slate doesn’t feel possible — it feels inevitable. A yearslong conversation is nearing its inflection point.
“The power league guys must decide what they want the postseason to look like,” said one bowl game executive. “Does it include bowls or not?”
[Enter Yahoo Fantasy Bracket Mayhem now for your shot at $50K]
The leaders of the power conferences have been exploring proposals to dramatically change the financial structure and selection process of the non-CFP bowl games — at least those tied to the Big 12, SEC, ACC and Big Ten.
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In one proposal shared with high-level administrators, a consortium of 10 bowl games — each pitting power conference programs — would be created and potentially sold on the open market, with its television rights controlled by the conferences themselves instead of the bowls. Presumably, these games will be played in existing bowls, but their participants would vary as the bowl system untethers from its traditional conference affiliations.
Could this mean an SEC team in the Alamo or Holiday Bowl? What about a Big 12 team at the Citrus or Gator?
What’s not to like? Five teams from each power league get tossed into a bucket, paired together based on attractive matchups, meet in interesting, new cities and make more cash than they currently generate.
The Pop-Tarts Bowl between BYU and Georgia Tech had the second-most viewers in non-CFP bowls this past postseason, just behind the Texas vs. Michigan Citrus Bowl. (Peter Joneleit/Getty Images)
(Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)
After all, the top-10 most-watched non-CFP bowls last year averaged a rating of 5.8 million viewers, per Bowl Season. That’s more than the average rating in the NBA’s Western Conference finals last year, which produced the champion Oklahoma City Thunder.
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The consortium plan provides flexibility in matchups, potentially incorporates new television partners (Apple, Amazon, Fox?) and, at least for the power leagues, limits the amount of bowl options at a time of opt-outs (perhaps not all bowl-eligible conference teams participate in a bowl?).
The conversation about bowl eligibility — 6-6 or a return to 7-5 — is expected to continue, too. It’s been a long-running discussion.
What happens next?
The proposal is in the early stages of socialization among college stakeholders and ESPN — the primary bowl game television partner who has been a part of the proposal itself.
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A target for any bowl remake is the 2027 season. This year’s upcoming bowl slate isn’t expected to undergo major changes.
Despite most bowl contracts expiring this year — bowls hold contracts with TV partners and specific conferences — many of them are extending deals by only a year given the uncertainty of the CFP expansion conversation, which continues as the SEC and Big Ten disagreement rages onward.
In fact, the number of CFP teams may determine exactly what happens with this power-conference bowl proposal. A move to 24 teams — the Big Ten’s plan — may see very few power conference bowl games existing in the future. But remaining at 12 or 16 paves a path for their survival.
The one-year bowl-contract extensions this year give way to the different structure starting in 2027, according to the proposal. No more conference affiliations. No more bowl games controlling TV rights and league payouts. It’s unclear if bowls will retain title sponsorship rights or ticketing oversight.
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But a model currently exists in shifting TV rights and sponsorships to another entity controlled by the conferences: the CFP. It owns the media rights and title sponsorship of the six bowls that are part of the playoff’s quarterfinal and semifinal rotation (Orange, Rose, Fiesta, Sugar, Peach and Cotton).
The CFP distributes to those bowls a “management fee” for operating the game.
“The model already exists,” says one bowl director.
What happens to the other bowls?
Well, two bowls shuttered recently (Los Angeles and Detroit) and a third (Bahamas) has relocated.
Six bowls are part of the CFP and, in this proposal, 10-or-so bowls would be part of this new consortium. That leaves more than 20 bowl games, many of them pitting Group of Six teams or Group of Six against power league teams. Most of them (17) are owned by ESPN.
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Playoff expansion has further exacerbated a long-running narrative that bowls are slipping into irrelevancy, but that’s not necessarily the case considering television viewership. All non-CFP bowls last year averaged more than 3 million viewers a game, and though that figure is buoyed by all-power league bowls, some of the Group of Six games earned well over 1 million viewers.
Their future may depend on ESPN, which, again, owns most of them. Does it need these games to fill television windows during the holidays? Most would say yes — unless the playoff gets big enough that windows start to fill.
Experts believe it is unlikely that many other networks would buy these bowls. It may even be unlikely that others seriously bid on the proposed consortium of 10 P4 bowls. ESPN has more windows than all others. And, remember, the NBA, NHL and NFL seasons are playing out across December, too, likely further shrinking the number of network bidders.
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If you’re wondering how valuable to television a bowl game is, look to the cash that each game distributes to the conferences of participants. They range widely from $250,000 to more than $8 million. The top-10 non-CFP bowls — all pitting power conference teams against each other — paid out more than a combined $50 million last year.
Either way, bowl games appear to have a future. There is light at the end of the proverbial tunnel — at least for now.
Questioned about the viability of bowl games, one stakeholder pointed to Coca-Cola’s title sponsorship last year of Bowl Season, the trade association of bowls.
“I’d say that’s pretty significant.”
