Idiots Write About Sports

Commenting on the likelihood of Cal appearing in the Las Vegas Bowl — made ever more likely by Stanford’s sliding-glass-door defense against Notre Dame — in this thread, reader Larry Renolds asks:

The big issue is why does the Pac10 get to play all these losers in our bowl games? I guess this is the price for being on FSN.

This is probably a better question for Jason to handle, since I’ve personally witnessed his angry diatribe about the Pac-10’s bowl commitments, but this has nothing to do with Fox Sports Net, Larry. It has every thing to do with poor leadership on the part of the Pac-10.

Consider for a moment the bowl commitments of the other conferences whose champions get automatic berths in the four BCS games.

• The runner-up in the SEC gets to go to the Capital Bowl Game in Orlando on New Year’s Day.
• So does the Big 10 runner up.
• The Big 12 runner-up plays in the Cotton Bowl on January 1.
• The ACC runner-up makes do with the New Year’s Day Gator Bowl.
• In theory, the Big East runner-up winds up in the Gator Bowl, too, unless Notre Dame gets that spot. If that’s the case, the Big East No. 2 team likely winds up in what is now called the Meineke Car Bowl, played in Charlotte, N.C., on New Year’s Eve.

So where does the No. 2 Pac-10 team wind up? Assuming they don’t qualify for one of the at-large berth in the BCS games, the runner-up is assured a place in the Holiday Bowl, played a full three days before the marquee games on New Year’s Day. The opponent? The third-place Big 12 team.

Look, I got nothing against the Holiday Bowl. San Diego’s a good a place as any to spend late December. It’s just not exactly the most glamorous locale for the second-place team in one of the country’s elite conferences. And the blame for that has to fall on the conference commissioners who negotiated the Pac-10’s bowl game commitments in the first place.

So the Pac-10 has two choices: either negotiate a better deal with a more prestigious bowl game or create an entirely new game to feature its runner-up. That second option is probably the more likely one when you consider that, of the New Year’s Day Games, only two are played west of the Mississippi. The Fiesta Bowl is already spoken for, BCS-wise, and the Cotton Bowl has both the Big 12 runner-up and an SEC team.

So why not create your own bowl game for either New Year’s Eve or New Year’s Day? Hold it in Los Angeles or San Francisco or some other West Coast City. Invite a No. 2 or No. 3 team from one of the power conferences or even the Mountain West champ. It may sound like a minor thing, but the Fiesta Bowl had some pretty humble origins, and it’s done pretty well for itself recently.

Of course the Fiesta Bowl should be one of the biggest supporters of West Coast Football, but I'm sure they won't be this year.

I was just talking about this with my wife and she said the Holiday Bowl is the best non-New Years bowl game out there. I told her that is the problem.

Anyway, it has to be a new bowl game. Pac10 fans won't travel back east (even El Paso is tough), but we all travel to the Holiday Bowl or the Phoenix bowls. If the NFL fixes the Coliseum, then that might be a great time/place to start a new bowl game.

Don't forget the Rose Bowl, Phil, which is usually on January 1, except when the BCS intervenes.

But I agree 100% (you knew I would): the Pac-10 needs to create a new Jan. 1 bowl game in the west somewhere. But where? I keep thinking that the best thing to do is move the Holiday Bowl to Jan. 1, but I don't think anyone wants to do that. Maybe the Pac-10 could convince the San Francisco Bowl to relocate to Jan. 1? Or how about a new bowl at the new Stanford Stadium?

Posted by Jason at November 27, 2005 09:44 AM

Since the Silicon Valley "Classic" is now defunct after four seasons why can't the promoters try to revive it as a Pac-10 bowl?

How in the hell can something that's four years old be called a "classic?"

The Silicon Valley bowl is a failure because a lot of people in the Bay Area can care less about college football. Furthermore, most of the people aren't Bay Area natives, and they pack home for the holidays.

Judging by the fan poll results on ESPN whether Oregon deserves a BCS bid, there's an inherent PAC-10 bias in the midwest and many eastern states. (Surprisingly, Texas is pro-Oregon ... perhaps they feel guilty after snubbing CAL last year?) The fact that a lot of games are broadcasted there at late nights certainly doesn't help the cause.

We can use a new BOWL, but it has to make economic sense and some perks for a big name school to fly over.

My personal theory about the Silicon Valley bowl's failure is because it's WAC bowl hosted by San Jose State. Nobody in the Bay Area cares about San Jose State football, not even people who go to San Jose State.

I think a Pac-10 bowl in the Bay Area (besides the Emerald Bowl) would do better, more people go to Cal and Stanford games which is Pac-10 than San Jose State which is WAC (and it's really wack).

The Emerald Bowl can be cosidered a sucessful bowl, but that's because people want to go to San Francisco.

hello guys, my cousin jimmy and i are already planning on making the trip to vegas. however, when will we know for sure that cal will play in the vegas bowl? i need to know, because my job requires that i be on call 24 hrs a day, etc. anyways, is there anyway to know before the official announcement? probably not, but i always think wishfully.

Nobody will know until the BCS makes its selections, which isn't until Dec. 4 or 5... but I really doubt that Oregon's going to get selected for the BCS.

Posted by Jason at November 28, 2005 09:17 PM

Seth, when I ordered my "priority tickets" through the Cal ticket office online, it said that we'll know for sure how many tickets we get for which bowl by December 8th. Of course that means they have to know what bowl it is by that date.

What also surprised me is that the number of season tickets one has means bumkis as to how many tickets one can get "priority" for. Even though I have 5, I only get "priority" on 2. The only way to get more "priority" tickets it to be a donor. What gives with that?

You may also want to consider buying tickets directly from the Vegas bowl. Supporting Cal Athletics is important... but the Vegas Bowl is selling General Admission tickets for $10.

As for the anti-PAC-10 bias in the Midwest & back East, consider how the national writers who yell their way through "Around the Horn" flatly stated that "no one" cares about Oregon. (Yes, I must admit that I get caught watching that shameful display from time-to-time.) Apparently "no one" lives east of the Central time zone. It seems year in and year out, if one of the big conferences has a team that gets snubbed (either from the national title game or any of the BCS games), it's inevitably a team from the PAC-10: Oregon, Cal, Oregon once again this year (in all likelihood). What gives? I guess Notre Dame brings ratings somewhere, but I'll be damned if I've ever watched a ND game that wasn't vs. a PAC-10 team--and I'm not starting this year.

"No one"? What about Plaschke? He's a total Pac-10 backer, and that's why this blog loves him so much.

Since the Fiesta Bowl will be moving to the new Arizona Cardinals Stadium after this year and the Insight.com Bowl moves to Sun Devil Stadium...

Why not move that bowl to New Years day and invite the #2 Pac10 team and either the #2 Big12 or the #3 Big10 team? I'd guess you could lure one of them out here.

Hmm, that won't work...

Just noticed the insight.com bowl dumpted the pac10 next year. What a disaster....

Yes, the Pac-10 bowl line-up gets even worse next year. It's pretty hard to fathom.

When the bowl season is over, I'm going to call Pac-10 HQ and see if I can get an interview with someone there about the conference's bowl match-ups. It would be interested to get this from the horse's mouth.

Posted by Jason at November 30, 2005 10:03 AM

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