Where did all the bowl fans go?

[HedleyLamarr]

Doing some catching up on my reading, and thought this is worthy of meaningful discussion. For the discussion at hand, please refrain from "playoff talk"....save that for the other thread taking place.

From the Birmingham News roughly a week ago:

BIRMINGHAM, Alabama -- Bowl games have a problem. They know it -- or at least they should. Fans know it, too, and are finally speaking out with their wallets by disguising themselves as empty seats.

Through 30 games prior to Wednesday's Orange Bowl, the announced bowl attendance this season averaged 49,000 fans, down 3 percent from this time a year ago. At this rate, the average will dip below 51,000 for the only the second time since 1979, according to USA Today.

And that's just announced attendance, which bowls can decide however they choose. Some sites have had ridiculously large numbers of empty seats, and that's becoming the norm for the industry, not the exception.

It's always a little dangerous to presume why people don't attend games. But it would be a mistake to brush this off as an aberration, especially as conferences demand larger payouts for bowls and bowls demand teams to purchase ticket amounts they can't possibly sell.

The economy could certainly be a factor, although our country's woes didn't just start this year. Why spend money to travel when you've got a better and cheaper view watching your high-definition television?

But I suspect there's a larger disconnect than that. The public feels more dissatisfied more than ever about college football.

Not the actual game. Fans love the game and will enjoy good bowl games, of which there have been several this season. Rather, there's frustration with how their games are managed.

Frustration with schools jumping conferences for TV dollars, costing rivalries to disappear and fans to pony up more money to figure out who's playing where.

Frustration with the number of bowl games and how the teams are selected, taking meaning out of making the postseason and where your team is slotted.

Frustration with a great sport that won't give the public a playoff, continuing to provide dissatisfying or controversial finishes to otherwise great seasons.

Fans aren't dumb. They know when they're getting played, whether it's games that don't matter, matchups that don't make sense, or buying tickets from schools that don't go as low as the open market.

Pro-BCS folks say a playoff would hurt the bowl tradition. They neglect to mention the sport already sold out a sacred tradition, New Year's Day, by stretching out the bowl season to milk every dollar and watering down Jan. 1.

Three years ago, Florida State became the first team in 58 years to play on New Year's Day without a winning record. Four more 6-6 teams have since followed on the game's New Year's date.

Ten years ago, there were 25 bowls that averaged 53,392 fans per game. In each of the past three years, with 34 or 35 bowls, attendance is hovering at 50,000 or lower, roughly a 6-percent drop in the past decade.

This week's Sugar Bowl, in which Virginia Tech was chosen to play with a questionable resume, had 64,512 fans. That was the Sugar's third-lowest draw in the past 72 years and the second time in three years it fell about 12,000 short of capacity.

The Outback Bowl announced 49,429, the third smallest in its 26-year history. The past four Outbacks averaged 53,625 fans, compared to 64,532 in the previous eight years.

The list goes on. The Poinsettia had the smallest crowd in its seven-year history. The Holiday produced its worst since 1997. The Sun drew its fewest since 2001. The Las Vegas and the Armed Forces had their lowest since 2004. The Kraft Fight Hunger had its smallest since 2005. The Music City saw its worst since 2008.

Three bowl games have averaged fewer crowds in the past three years than the International Bowl in Toronto did over its four-year life (30,135) before dying. Take a bow, Famous Idaho Potato (26,750), New Mexico (27,695) and Military (28,726).

Bowls once were designed strictly for local communities. Now they're TV programming to get us through the holidays.

That doesn't mean bowls shouldn't exist. I enjoy bowls, the good ones I think will be interesting and competitive. But the current bowl system is holding back the sport's future.

The sooner college football accepts it, the better off the game will be.

For most of the bowl games, there was one recurring theme: There were a ton of empty seats. Even the BCS games weren't immune....a reporter for a Virginia paper reported that the Sugar Bowl was about 35-40% empty.

But...why? Surely, there's not going to be just one reason to explain why bowl games from Las Vegas to New Orleans to Tampa were rather empty.

The economy is obviously a chief reason, but it's got to be more than that.

Is it the number of bowl games?

Is there not enough time between "Bowl Selection Sunday" and the dates of the bowls? (When plane tickets, et al, cost more?)

Is it the location of these games in relation to the schools participating?

Could it be that folks would rather just watch these games on their high-definition TV's?

Could it be that folks feel the non-BCS bowls just aren't worth attending or spending money on?

Any other reasons lurking out there?

[bosrs1]

It's simple, too many bowl games. The importance of the games has waned due to the dilution of talent and "deserving" teams. I mean come on, a 6-7 coachless team playing a 6-6 coachless team at the Toilet Bowl in San Francisco? It's joke. Neither team had any business being in a bowl. A winning record should be a minimum requirement in the future for bowl entry. And if there aren't enough teams, start axing the low end bowls that can't find qualifiers. I doubt the 5,000 people for example that showed up in San Francisco for example after paying drastically reduced prices on Stub Hub would really be all that upset to lose their bowl game. And I'm not picking on SF, there are plenty of other bowls out there that were equally as pathetic.

[CS85]

Is it the number of bowl games?

Yes. I don't think bowls have any relevance other than the two schools playing in them. I understand the NCAA wants to honor a lot of their traditional rivalries but who wants to watch two .500 teams play in an absurdly sponsored bowl?

Any other reasons lurking out there?

The challenge to the NCAA is to make the middle ground football enthusiast care. I enjoy college football but I can only invest so much in it because there is no payoff. I hate that regular season rivalries are basically IT for the season. Anything after that is pure fluff, barring a major bowl entry. But even then it's like...this is it? A bowl is supposed to be a reward, I suppose, but to me it seems like a consolation prize for not playing in the right conference against the right schedule.

[dfwabel]

Part of it is location in relation to locals buying tickets. Some games i.e. Boise, Charlotte, Detroit, Washington, DC are not looking for visitors to fill up the stadium, but are looking for people who are at worse a, "one tank trip" away

Five metro areas have nearly 30% of the bowl games.

Cities have multiple games, so the locals have a choice with their disposable income, specifically around the holidays.

If you are a local citizen with no ties to a participating team, and want to go to one game, which one would you attend?

Dallas/Fort Worth: ATT Cotton Bowl, Armed Forces Bowl, Ticket City Bowl

New Orleans: Allstate Sugar Bowl, R+L Carriers New Orleans Bowl

Tampa/St. Pete: Outback Bowl, Beef O'Brady's Bowl

San Diego: Holiday Bowl, Poinsettia Bowl (Those sponsors are so spare, I won't name them)

Orlando: Capital One Bowl, Champs Sports Bowl

This also does not include the BCS title game in which a city gets an additional game and that host bowl has the first dibs at ticket inventory for the title game.

And if you are a business owner, you will most likely sponsor one of the games as well.

Part of it was also the impact of where the Christmas and New Years fell compared with air travel demands. Weekend travel + being a New Years Weekend impacted last minute available flights, especially to California and Florida.

Rovell talked about the air travel impact as fat back as 2008.

[pmoehrin]

Part of it is the economy but I think more of it is that people just don't care as much as they used to. I also know alot of people including myself have been completely turned off by what's been going on with college football as of late. The entire sport just seems to be ripe with corruption with no hope of any of it being addressed internally. The programs are just running wild and doing whatever they want. The NCAA has lost complete control of the situation. The power conferences are no longer satisfied with most of the pie. Now they want all of it. It seems to be all about athletic programs of these major programs want. Academics, integrity and the fans be damned. At best I would describe college football as a badly functioning system that is only being sustained by the massive inflow of money to the major programs and extreme fan loyalty and at worst a completely unchecked and unregulated sport where fictional a program like Blue Mountain State is not far off from the truth of what alot of the institutions are like and in Penn State's an less corrupt program. A program that nobody would have even thought of being in violation of any NCAA rules. Turns out that program in part allowed actions to take place that were far worse then anything SMU, Miami or USC ever did. It would be nice to say if one person could only be held accountable for this but that is clearly not the case. If football has the power to lead to a coverup of that magnitude at the highest level possible of an institution the size of Penn State, there needs to serious change.

Point being I think college football and major college athletics in general has a major image issue that they need to address and I think that may be coming soon. I said there was no chance of it internally being corrected but I see more and more professors, politicians and people with the power to effect change even though they have no direct relation to college football getting more and more fed up with the way things are being run almost by the day.

As far as TV goes even I will though will still watch the National title game and some of the major bowl games. The games I'm not going to watch though are pretty much any regular season game that doesn't have two top five teams in it or any of these minor bowl games. I can't say I speak for everyone but that's the reason I cite for not watching.

[Sodboy13]

Plus, the bowls don't have to care much about butts in seats, because they extort schools into committing to buy tens of thousands of tickets for the "privilege" of appearing in their bowl game. Who cares who shows up? They got theirs. And when you consider the "they" in the case of seven of the most bottom-of-the-barrel bowls is ESPN, proud owner and operator of the BBVA Compass, Sheraton Hawai'i, MAACO Las Vegas, Meineke Car Care of Texas, New Mexico, Bell Helicopter Armed Forces, and Beef 'O' Brady's Bowls, well, you can see how this nice little incestuous arrangement makes its money, attendance and interest be damned.

[dfwabel]

Plus, the bowls don't have to care much about butts in seats, because they extort schools into committing to buy tens of thousands of tickets for the "privilege" of appearing in their bowl game. Who cares who shows up? They got theirs. And when you consider the "they" in the case of seven of the most bottom-of-the-barrel bowls is ESPN, proud owner and operator of the BBVA Compass, Sheraton Hawai'i, MAACO Las Vegas, Meineke Car Care of Texas, New Mexico, Bell Helicopter Armed Forces, and Beef 'O' Brady's Bowls, well, you can see how this nice little incestuous arrangement makes its money, attendance and interest be damned.

Even in the lower bowl games, like the Motor City Bowl, the seats the teams must buy do not cover the total gate. Little Caesars Pizza Bowl teams get 11K tickets @ $45 (in 2008 it was $32). Same goes with the Compass Bowl in Birmingham. ESPN told Pitt to go there for a second year as opposed to going to another Big East bowl.

[pmoehrin]

I remember one year I was watching the Insight Bowl and they said Insight had bought out about 3,000 tickets for people that worked for the company.

That's about 10% of the people that were at the game. I would imagine they aren't the only company that does that either, so even the attendance figures might be a little skewed both now and in the past. I highly doubt even a quarter of those people would have gone to the game had they not been given a ticket for free.

[dfwabel]

I remember one year I was watching the Insight Bowl and they said Insight had bought out about 3,000 tickets for people that worked for the company.

That's about 10% of the people that were at the game. I would imagine they aren't the only company that does that either, so even the attendance figures might be a little skewed both now and in the past. I highly doubt even a quarter of those people would have gone to the game had they not been given a ticket for free.

Remember, teams will accpet a lower bowl just because they get more practice days even if they lose money going there.

For the 2008 Motor City Bowl, FAU basically bought their way into the game. First, they paid $200K to the bowl, just to get the extra practice days. Secondly, the school told the season ticket holders and boosters, who they knew were not going to travel to Detroit to buy a seat at a "reduced rate" for a Detroit area youth and military charities.

[TBGKon]

Part of it is location in relation to locals buying tickets. Some games i.e. Boise, Charlotte, Detroit, Washington, DC are not looking for visitors to fill up the stadium, but are looking for people who are at worse a, "one tank trip" away

Five metro areas have nearly 30% of the bowl games.

Cities have multiple games, so the locals have a choice with their disposable income, specifically around the holidays.

If you are a local citizen with no ties to a participating team, and want to go to one game, which one would you attend?

Dallas/Fort Worth: ATT Cotton Bowl, Armed Forces Bowl, Ticket City Bowl

New Orleans: Allstate Sugar Bowl, R+L Carriers New Orleans Bowl

Tampa/St. Pete: Outback Bowl, Beef O'Brady's Bowl

San Diego: Holiday Bowl, Poinsettia Bowl (Those sponsors are so spare, I won't name them)

Orlando: Capital One Bowl, Champs Sports Bowl

This also does not include the BCS title game in which a city gets an additional game and that host bowl has the first dibs at ticket inventory for the title game.

And if you are a business owner, you will most likely sponsor one of the games as well.

Part of it was also the impact of where the Christmas and New Years fell compared with air travel demands. Weekend travel + being a New Years Weekend impacted last minute available flights, especially to California and Florida.

Rovell talked about the air travel impact as fat back as 2008.

Phoenix also has 2 bowls, Fiesta and Insight.

[texfischer]

Way too many bowl games, trim it down. And screw the BCS. Go to a playoff, use the bowl games as playoff games.

[Cola]

I'll give you two reasons of my own:

1. Bowl scheduling, first and foremost. How in the hell do you schedule the Outback, Capital One, and Gator bowls on the same day starting at the exact same time in the same state? It's a nightmare for those viewing at home...but what if a huge college fan wanted to mark seeing Nebraska play off of their bucket list, but is also from Georgia and wanted to watch his team? It makes no sense.

2. Ticket availability. I'm a South Carolina donor and I will say this is the last year I will purchase bowl game tickets through the Gamecock Club. Why? Again, it makes no sense and hardly has any advantage to the fan or person attending. The bowl games toss this huge allotment of seats at the schools and basically tell them they are stuck with them...only problem is they are the worst seats in the house. All of the 30 to 30 lower level, 30 to 30 second level, and 40 to 40 upper level are saved by the bowl game themselves to sell through their own outlets.

Once you get past that, you are still overpaying. All tickets through the Gamecock Club were $87 a piece and you were issued tickets based on donor level and points within club...but no matter where you ended up getting a seat, it was $87. The Capital One bowl sold $50 tickets in the upper level. Not only that, but once the market played out...you could get seats in my section (corner endzone lower level) for near HALF of what I paid. I saw them going for about $50-55 a piece before gametime on StubHub.

How am I suppose to feel about that? The Gamecock Club wants me to purchase from them because the University will get stuck with the bill if we don't...but yet, they aren't offering me any reason (besides simply supporting the program) to buy through them.

[NJTank]

The fans want a playoff system and there are way to many bowl games, so I am not shocked that the attendence is down. Plus Clemson vs West Virginia is not what I would call a intersting match up.

[walkerws]

The fans want a playoff system and there are way to many bowl games, so I am not shocked that the attendence is down. Plus Clemson vs West Virginia is not what I would call a intersting match up.

Bowl attendance is not tied to playoff apathy. Most of these events have become overpriced and that will keep people away. Also, it's the holidays. Not a ton of disposable income at that time and with airlines gouging flight prices, the east coast fans are less likely to travel to the west coast to support thir teams if it's $300+ a head to get on a plane, $50-$100 a ticket, and you've quickly outpriced a middle income family of four.

[Saintsfan]

Areen't a lot of these games, in effect, playoffs for 19th and 2oth best team in the country? Who is really going to be interested in that? Hasn't the BCS national championship essentially killed a lot of these games off, to an extent? I'd advocate some for of playoff if you could maintain some of the historic names of bowls such as the Rose Bowl.

[KDubK414]

The fans want a playoff system and there are way to many bowl games, so I am not shocked that the attendence is down. Plus Clemson vs West Virginia is not what I would call a intersting match up.

Bowl attendance is not tied to playoff apathy. Most of these events have become overpriced and that will keep people away. Also, it's the holidays. Not a ton of disposable income at that time and with airlines gouging flight prices, the east coast fans are less likely to travel to the west coast to support thir teams if it's $300+ a head to get on a plane, $50-$100 a ticket, and you've quickly outpriced a middle income family of four.

Not to mention even the crappiest Motel 6 or Super 8 in the immediate areas will be charging in upwards of $100 to $200 a night for lodging.

[Lights Out]

Number of bowls and boring matchups certainly are conspiring to reduce the attraction of bowl season. The fact is, the bowl system may have worked in the '50s, but people's tastes and interests have changed.

The BCS seems to think that nobody will watch unless "name schools" like Michigan, Virginia Tech, Bama, etc. get in at all costs... but ratings don't back that up. The Michigan/VT Sugar Bowl was the lowest-rated BCS bowl this season IIRC, while the Fiesta Bowl, featuring the very non-traditional matchup of Stanford and Oklahoma State, garnered very strong ratings. By pandering to the small minority of myopic, tradition-obsessed diehards, the BCS is losing the interest of neutral casual fans who just want a good matchup and to hell with name value.

[RedSox44]

Number of bowls and boring matchups certainly are conspiring to reduce the attraction of bowl season. The fact is, the bowl system may have worked in the '50s, but people's tastes and interests have changed.

The BCS seems to think that nobody will watch unless "name schools" like Michigan, Virginia Tech, Bama, etc. get in at all costs... but ratings don't back that up. The Michigan/VT Sugar Bowl was the lowest-rated BCS bowl this season IIRC, while the Fiesta Bowl, featuring the very non-traditional matchup of Stanford and Oklahoma State, garnered very strong ratings. By pandering to the small minority of myopic, tradition-obsessed diehards, the BCS is losing the interest of neutral casual fans who just want a good matchup and to hell with name value.

There's one reason why people were watching the Fiesta Bowl.

His name is Luck.

[Seadragon76]

I wonder if some of this can be attributed to when the games are played. I know that the Orange Bowl this season fell on a Wednesday, which happened to be the first day after the extended New Year's break and for many students, that is the first day in class for them.

If it were easier to put the games on days where they would be more likely to attend (Friday and Saturday), that might help.

Other then that... I don't know.

[bosrs1]

Part of it is location in relation to locals buying tickets. Some games i.e. Boise, Charlotte, Detroit, Washington, DC are not looking for visitors to fill up the stadium, but are looking for people who are at worse a, "one tank trip" away

Five metro areas have nearly 30% of the bowl games.

Cities have multiple games, so the locals have a choice with their disposable income, specifically around the holidays.

If you are a local citizen with no ties to a participating team, and want to go to one game, which one would you attend?

Dallas/Fort Worth: ATT Cotton Bowl, Armed Forces Bowl, Ticket City Bowl

New Orleans: Allstate Sugar Bowl, R+L Carriers New Orleans Bowl

Tampa/St. Pete: Outback Bowl, Beef O'Brady's Bowl

San Diego: Holiday Bowl, Poinsettia Bowl (Those sponsors are so spare, I won't name them)

Orlando: Capital One Bowl, Champs Sports Bowl

This also does not include the BCS title game in which a city gets an additional game and that host bowl has the first dibs at ticket inventory for the title game.

And if you are a business owner, you will most likely sponsor one of the games as well.

Part of it was also the impact of where the Christmas and New Years fell compared with air travel demands. Weekend travel + being a New Years Weekend impacted last minute available flights, especially to California and Florida.

Rovell talked about the air travel impact as fat back as 2008.

Phoenix also has 2 bowls, Fiesta and Insight.

Actually Phoenix has no bowls anymore. Insight moved from Phoenix to Tempe a few years ago and Fiesta is in Glendale.