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I have been tracking the 2010 - 2013 Bowl Deals on a Spreadsheet.
Two new bowls have been added - the New York Yankees Bowl and the Dallas Football Classic (to be played at the renovated Cotton Bowl Stadium, as the actual AT&T Cotton Bowl Game moves to the new 100,000 seat Jerry Jones ["I'm compensating for my small _____"] Stadium in Arlington.
Right now agreements are in place for all but:
International Bowl (Toronto) - MAC is in, but Big East has yet to renew.
Roady's Humanitarian Bowl (Boise) - WAC is in, but PAC / MWC have both said no, they are chasing the MAC
papajohns.com Bowl (Birmingham) - they can ink SEC #9 (however, SEC may not have 9 teams eligible, this would actually be SEC#10, if SEC gets 2 into BCS), Big East is on hold, Sun Belt is willing as primary or back-up
magicJack St. Petersburg Bowl - CUSA is in, Big East is on Hold, Sun Belt is willing as primary or back-up.
The bowl deals seem to be a zero-sum game. Unless you add teams, or lower the standards for bowl eligibility, you run out of bowl-eligible teams around 68 (34 bowls). Several of these "bottom-rung" games only exist, so that ESPN has something to televise. The current payouts for the "bottom-rung" games are $250,000 - $300,000. Rutgers got stuck in the papajohns.com Bowl a few years back ($300,000) and took a big financial hit.
Since 2 new bowl games have been added (Yankee and Dallas), 2 are likely going to have to disapper. The Big East had partnered with International, papajohn's and St. Petersburg, but the Yankee Bowl picked off a higher-up team, and the Big East isn't going to be able to renew all three, unless you assume 7 of their 8 schools will be bowl-eligible (a bit of a stretch).
So here's my bet.... Big East will only play in papajohns.com IF they get SEC #8. They would have to really up their bids to steal SEC#8 from Liberty, and up payment to BE to pull this off. ESPN is the main sponsor of both. They won't bid against themselves, so BE will pull out, and papajohns will be left with an iffy SEC #9 vs. the Sun-Belt #3 (Sun-Belt #1 / #2 will rotate between New Orleans Bowl and GMAC (Mobile)). THIS IS VERY TENUOUS.
Roady's... Nobody is too interested in Boise in the Winter (sorry !). The MAC might go, if the International fell through, and the money was right....
International Bowl... Indoor, not so far from BE / MAC footprint. I see this getting renewed, and the BE pulling out of papajohns and the MAC saying no to Boise. BE #5/6 vs. MAC #3
St. Petersburg... BE would rather play CUSA in St. Petersburg than Sun-Belt in Mobile. CUSA is on board with St. Petersburg. BE #5/6 vs. CUSA team (chosen in negotiation with CUSA Office).
This is all on hold, while papajohns tries to up their offer and move up on SEC & BE pecking order. Assuming that does NOT happen, I see the NCAA decertifying the Humanitarian (Boise) and papajohns.com (Birmingham) bowls.
Stay tuned.
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