Are there too many bowls? Depends on whom you ask.

Coaches would answer no, because they get another game, more practice time and a chance to see what the younger players can do.

Fans are glad for the extra football, as it definitely beats visiting with relatives you can’t stand seeing even once a year. Even if some schools end up losing money by going to a bowl.

But are they good matchups? Who was clamoring for Troy vs. Ohio in a mostly empty Superdome?

If you ask ESPN, they’d probably say, the more, the merrier. The Worldwide Leader would be reduced to show ice skating, no-limit poker tournaments and curling if not for all of the 35 bowls, 31 of which are shown on its networks.

There are so many that cities are having to double and triple up on these games.

New Orleans has two bowl games, one well-attended and historic (the Sugar Bowl), the other (Lets-find-another-sponsor New Orleans Bowl) not so much. The cameras at last year’s New Orleans Bowl didn’t pan to the upper deck of the Superdome and for good reason, since it was empty.

Dallas has three bowl games, two of which are of dubious value. Bad things usually come in threes. So do zingers. There’s the Cotton Bowl you know. The Armed Forces Bowl you might. The one you night not know about, the Ticketcity Bowl, will be new this year and will be played in the Cotton Bowl.

Birmingham, which has a decaying, rusted relic of an outdoor stadium older than Methusaleh’s mother, has a bowl game and really shouldn’t be after failing in the bowl game business not once, but thrice with the Dixie Bowl, the All-American Bowl and the Vulcan Bowl (named after the Roman god of metalworking, not Spock’s home planet). In case you’re not aware, the outdoors weather usually isn’t the best in the Magic City when the Pizza/Compass Bank/Whatever-it’s-called Bowl is played. Crowds likely will be sparser than Republicans at a Moveon.org rally.

Then there are bowl games played at baseball stadiums, which is kind of ironic considering that baseball teams once had to play nearly exclusively in featureless multipurpose hockey pucks. Southern Miss and Louisville played in the Beef Oh-Don’t-Forget-the-Apostrophes Brady’s Bowl at Tropicana Field, a mall masquerading as an indoor baseball stadium. San Francisco has a bowl game at AT&T Park and the name of it has changed three times. Call that one the Confusion Bowl. The Yankees are hosting a bowl game, the Pinstripe Bowl, and that makes as much sense as a sauerkraut and peanut butter sandwich since the weather the day before New Year’s Eve in New York is usually cold, wet and miserable. Good for football, bad for fans. The last time a bowl game was played in New York, the Gotham Bowl in 1962, it was played in front of an optimistic estimate of 6,166 fans. Doesn’t anyone read their history?

Despite the overload, there are even some bowl games in the on-deck circle waiting for one of the 35 others to fail. Orlando’s proposed Cure Bowl, which would benefit the Susan G. Komen Foundation, sounds like a goth fantasy. Cure frontman Robert Smith and his mopey band could play halftime. I guess “Friday, I’m in a bowl” would work as replacement lyrics for “Friday, I’m in Love.” Maybe Siouxsie and the Banshees could play a set too.

It’s a shame that we can’t bring back such classics as the Bacardi Bowl (Southern Miss played in the final one in Cuba in 1946), the Cigar Bowl, the Oil Bowl, the Raisin Bowl and the Salad Bowl.

Now that would be must-see TV.

•

Steve Wilson is sports editor of The Vicksburg Post. You can follow him on Twitter at vpsportseditor. He can be reached at 601-636-4545, ext. 142 or at swilson@vicksburgpost.com.