The potential (and still very much speculative) shuffle in regards to the Big Ten and their Florida bowl tie-ins wasn't much of an issue for me me until this came through the reader, emph mine:
The Champs Sports Bowl, which currently has deals with the Big Ten and ACC, could encounter the same problem. Combined [Champs Sports and Capital One], the two games generate more than $70 million in economic impact for the region annually.
Glaring, non-bracketed disclaimer here: I'm no economist. However, because I consider most of this common sense, I'm moving forward with it.
So to get started: journalism demerit for not citing who came up with the $70 million. Even if $70 million is spent by the people attending these games (which is probably grossly inflated; the only ones who would pay an economist to count that kind of thing have an interest in it being very big), it's a tiny, tiny fraction of that amount that actually stays anywhere near Orlando. The vast majority of it gets put into a register at a chain restaurant, deposited by the manager the following Monday, and then inter-bank transfered up to Bethesda or Oak Brook or Bentonville. All cities far, far away from Florida.
The conferences? Well sure they want nicer venues. Better looking seats (and more of them!) are more likely to be purchased. More money equals higher payout, which is always nice. It's also a chance to mix it up; with two bowls in the same city, the mid-west traveler might tire of going to the same city so often. So, as always:
And I would love to claim the bowl games are the innocent underdogs here but, I mean, look at these logos:
That's three trademark notifications, two footballs, and zero historical references. So I have to ask the citiy and their "local businesses": why do Marriott, American Airlines, Applebee's and Wal-Mart care about the location? As far as I can tell, it's all rolling up into the same set of financial statements no matter who hosts the games.
So football. Now that I'm looking...the SEC tie-ins that follow fall to the Cotton and Outback, with the Outback in a position to simply displace the CapOne. The Cotton might also get a promotion, but I'm not sure what the Big Ten would do with the rest of their roll-call. While I'm sure the Motor City will get its hopes up, I doubt Delany would let this:
become a regular thing. Who knows, maybe the Big East will finally get a decent bowl tie-in.