Bowl Season

Mavric

Mavric

Yoda
Staff member
Here we go.

College football’s bowl season [/size]officially kicks off on Saturday afternoon with the [/size]Gildan New Mexico Bowl between New Mexico and the University of Texas at San Antonio. And it’s pretty typical for lower-tier bowls: The combatants aren’t very good — the Lobos and Roadrunners rank No. 81 and 101, respectively, in ESPN’s [/size]Football Power Index rankings — but make for a pretty even matchup and are likely to put on an offensive show. (According to Sports-Reference.com’s [/size]Simple Rating System, or SRS, the two teams are projected to combine for 71 points, about 22 percent more than the typical [/size]FBS game.[/size]1) It’s the kind of low-stakes pre-Christmas game meant primarily for fans, gamblers or otherwise inveterate college football junkies ([/size]raises hand).

(Disclosure: The Gildan New Mexico Bowl is one of 13 bowl games this year that are owned and operated by ESPN, the parent company of FiveThirtyEight.)
A couple of years ago, I wrote about the sport’s bloated bowl schedule, and things have only expanded since. Including the College Football Playoff championship game on Jan. 9, the FBS postseason now includes 41 bowl games over the span of 24 days, tying the all-time record set last year for the most jam-packed bowl season ever.
Click to expand...
538


paine-bowls-1.png


paine-bowls-2.png


 
And in terms of the quality of games, there are a lot more matchups that look like New Mexico-UTSA these days than, say, Ohio State vs. Clemson. To quantify this, I developed an index to rate the caliber of each bowl since the AP poll era began in 1936, grading each game on a 5-point scale (3 is average) based on three factors:


The quality of the teams involved....
How close the matchup is.....
How much offense the game is likely to feature......

Add up the scores in each category, and you get a sort of total measure for the entertainment value of each bowl. Here’s how this year’s crop stacks up:
Click to expand...
Further explanation in the article.

 
Mavric said:
And in terms of the quality of games, there are a lot more matchups that look like New Mexico-UTSA these days than, say, Ohio State vs. Clemson. To quantify this, I developed an index to rate the caliber of each bowl since the AP poll era began in 1936, grading each game on a 5-point scale (3 is average) based on three factors:


The quality of the teams involved....
How close the matchup is.....
How much offense the game is likely to feature......

Add up the scores in each category, and you get a sort of total measure for the entertainment value of each bowl. Here’s how this year’s crop stacks up:
Click to expand...
Further explanation in the article.
Click to expand...
For me this is the only factor. Is it a close game in the last 10 minutes? I'll watch. Is it a blow out in the 2nd quarter? DVR, here I come

 
So .... uh .... plenty of good seats available....


C0EB1kRUQAAix4I.jpg


 
Last edited by a moderator:
End of the 1st quarter

Idaho - 0

Colorado State - 0

Boring game so I stopped watching

Final score (no overtime)

Idaho - 61

Colorado State - 50

 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top