Pennington: Spare me, being bowled over is a strike three

There was a time when the whole thing was exciting. Fans looked forward to a dozen or so good games, featuring some really good teams.

If you were lucky, your team would hook up in some exotic port of call with a school they'd never played. Now it seems the fun's been taken out of things.

In the good old days, backroom deals meant that your favorite team could pretty much go anywhere in America and face off against pretty much any team in America.

Some bowls and teams took it too far and signed deals weeks before the end of the season, yes, but it was still more interesting than the current setup.

Now multi-year conference tie-ins ensure that you'll see similar match-ups every year. Hey, great, another Conference USA -- Mountain West donnybrook!

Seriously, it seems to me that Auburn has ended its season with either Penn State or Wisconsin every year since 1995.

It's too formulaic.

If the SEC and Big Ten hook up in two or three bowls, and the top halves of their conferences are always made up of the same teams, it stands to reason that the same teams will be playing each other every few years (Georgia and Purdue, for example).

In the old days, there weren't so darned many bowls, either. Yeah, yeah, "more student/athletes get to end their season with a win," etc, etc. Well, I'm not buying.

More student/athletes also get to end their season with a loss by this logic. And I don't think teams that finish 6-6 or even 7-5 team deserve the chance to win or lose in late December.

Congratulations, you just couldn't be more average.

Still there's a bowl on every corner, a fruit-colored jacket in every closet.

Thirty-two bowl games guarantee that 64 of the 119 Division I schools (more than half) will be rockin' around the Christmas tree. That's too many teams in too many crummy bowls is you ask me.

For example, which of the following bowls is made up?

The San Diego Credit Union Poinsettia Bowl? The Bell Helicopter Armed Forces Bowl? The Kellogg's Greater Michigan Cereal Bowl? Or the Meineke Car Care Bowl?

The Kellogg's Bowl was the made-up one, but don't be surprised if the Chamber of Commerce folks in Battle Creek don't get a hold of this column and say, "Hey, why not a bowl right here in good ol' Cereal City, USA?"

And more bowls jump in all the time. This year alone, there are four new ones. The Houston Bowl went belly-up last year and the Texas Bowl has replaced it.

The International Bowl is in Canada. The New Mexico Bowl is in Arizona. (Just kidding, it's in Albuquerque. And it's owned by ESPN. Think they'll talk much about it?)

The brand new Birmingham Bowl just paired up with a pizza magnate to name their game not after the brand of pizza, but after the pizza chain's Web site ... thus the papajohns.com Bowl. Birmingham Bowl we hardly knew ye.

Too many bowls, too many tie-ins, too much information. Makes ... my... brain ... hurt.

If you're a Tennessee fan, wanting to plan your holiday travels, good luck. Technically, there are seven possibilities for the Vols: Capital One in Orlando, Outback in Tampa, Music City in Nashville, Chick-fil-A in Atlanta (farewell, old Peach), Cotton in Dallas, Independence in Shreveport and Liberty in Memphis.

The Capital One probably won't take a 9-3 UT team over a 10-win Auburn, Arkansas, or Florida team. So that's out.

The Vols also won't drop to the Liberty or Independence bowls.

That leaves four potential destinations, but only three of those seem likely.

According to a couple of national Web sites and football gurus, the Vols could wind up in Dallas facing Oklahoma in the Cotton Bowl. That's probably the most attractive match-up for UT and their fans, but it's also unlikely.

The Cotton has made it clear that they prefer to bring in SEC West teams simply because their fans are more likely to travel to Dallas. So LSU, Arkansas, or Auburn will probably be more attractive to the Cotton than Tennessee.

That leaves UT looking at the Chick-fil-A (if Georgia loses to Georgia Tech today), the Outback (if they're not once again snubbed by a bowl that has a history of snubbing them), or the Music City (if things REALLY don't break their way.)

I don't know about you, but I'm starting to feel bowled under again.