Does College Football Really Need More Bowl Games?

Congratulations, Joe (College Football) Fan. Your holiday time programming could be expanding even more (not unlike your holiday waistline). So prepare the eggnog, shut yourself in the den and tune in, because more bowl games could be on the way. 

Brett McMurphy of ESPN.com reported on Wednesday that four cities have applied to the NCAA to add new bowl games for the upcoming 2015-16 season. Those four cities are: Austin, Texas; Tucson, Arizona; Little Rock, Arkansas; and Orlando, Florida. 

To answer the question that's asked every year: No, there are not too many bowl games, despite some borderline laughable numbers: 

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If approved as expected, there would be a record 43 bowl games, including the College Football Playoff title game, requiring 84 teams to fill each bowl. That would mean 66 percent of the 127 FBS teams would go bowling.

Wednesday was the deadline for cities seeking to add a new bowl. The NCAA will make a decision in a few weeks whether to approve the games.

Three of the four new bowls would feature teams from the American Athletic Conference. If those are approved, that would give the American nine bowl tie-ins for 12 teams in 2015 -- the highest percentage of bowl games per conference.

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Forty-three bowls, huh? Remember when the playoff would, according to some bowl execs, "put an end to [games like] the Maaco Las Vegas Bowl?"

Bowl games haven't perished in the playoff era; in fact, they're growing. McMurphy notes in his report that nine new bowls have been added in the past two years. (For a timeline reference, the playoff was formally approved by a presidential oversight committee in June of 2012.) "By comparison," McMurphy writes, "20 years ago there were only 18 bowls."

The key takeaway from the latest report of postseason expansion is that it directly impacts four of the five "Group of Five" conferences in the FBS: The American, Conference USA, the Mountain West and the Sun Belt (the fifth, unaffected conference being the MAC). Those are the conferences outside the "Power Five" leagues that rule major college football. 

With the financial gap widening between the Power Five and Group of Five, the latter is looking for any route possible to increase exposure. The new bowls, even if they're not broadcast on ESPN/ABC channels as McMurphy reports, are an easy route to achieve that goal. 

"As long as the standard to go to a bowl remains 6-6, commissioners will be pressured to have bowl games for all their conference teams to play in," an industry source told McMurphy. "That's why you keep seeing more and more bowls added." 

Take, for example, Temple. The Owls (6-6) from the AAC were one of five extra bowl-eligible teams—all from Group of Five conferences—passed over for a slot. Not surprisingly, the AAC is making a major push in the next round of bowl bidding. 

As long as there's a city and a stadium willing to host the game, a title sponsor willing to shell out money, conferences ready to tie in and media corporations willing to broadcast, bowl games will exist.

For all the concern about how the playoff would ruin the regular season, nothing has watered it down like allowing .500 teams to go bowling. The days of needing to win seven or eight games, at minimum, to go to the postseason are long gone. The demand for college football inventory is as high as it has ever been. 

That's not a bad thing, necessarily. It is what it is. Zach Barnett of CollegeFootballTalk.com correctly points out that bowl games are TV shows—they're entertainment. Adding more games provides more opportunities to watch football. 

And, occasionally, you get some great endings like the one between Central Michigan and Western Kentucky in the Bahamas Bowl: 

Of course, if you're really that worried about the number of upcoming bowls, know that college football might not be married the number 43. Just because the possibility of 43 bowls exist doesn't mean there will be 43 bowls. Not all of the bids may be approved, as Stewart Mandel of Fox Sports tweets. Conversely, it's always possible a smaller, pre-existing bowl has seen its last game. 

What we won't see anytime soon, if ever, is a decline in bowl games. There are simply too many factors that encourage postseason growth. 

If you're a fan of college football in all of its forms, this is great news. If you'd rather not watch a pair of 6-6 teams go at it in a converted baseball stadium, there's also good news.

You don't have to. 

Ben Kercheval is a lead writer for college football. All quotes cited unless obtained firsthand.