[Austroturf]

Bottom line, I think, is that whether something is meaningful or meaningless is in the eye of the beholder.

There is certainly a substantial portion of the world's population that thinks all American football is pretty meaningless.

Yes, this is a fair assessment.  My perspective on the significance or insignificance of a bow game revolves around two factors:
1) the significance of the match-up and
2) the significance of the result

On point one, many of the match-ups in the lower-tier bowls are truly meaningless.  Yesterday's offensively-challenged INT-fest was a prime example.  Cal was the lowest-seeded Pac-12 team, while TCU was tied with Baylor for lowest-seeded Big-12 team.  Not a significant match-up.  There's no rivalry, no past history, no narrative to make this more than two teams from the lower-middle tier of their conferences.  That said, it's not less significant than a typical regular season game; but bowl games are supposed to be something on a higher level (ostensibly).    

On point two, the outcomes of these games lack significance from a couple of perspectives.  The winner does not advance to a further round; there's no division or conference championship on the line; and, um, a W does not further the quest for bowl-eligibility (just had to throw that in there).  Now with more and more players sitting out the games, a further dimension of meaning has slipped away.  If teams increasingly enter these contests at diminished strength, what does it mean to beat Stanford or Pitt?  ASU most likely lost its game because of Harry's decision to skip the post-season. 

My overall dissatisfaction with the NCAA FBS post season is that there seem to be more and more meaningless match-ups; and the outcomes of these match-ups are declining in significance, particularly with the new trend for players to skip the post-season.  All in all, not a good trend.

[Austroturf]

Bottom line, I think, is that whether something is meaningful or meaningless is in the eye of the beholder.

There is certainly a substantial portion of the world's population that thinks all American football is pretty meaningless.

Yes, this is a fair assessment.  My perspective on the significance or insignificance of a bow game revolves around two factors:
1) the significance of the match-up and
2) the significance of the result

On point one, many of the match-ups in the lower-tier bowls are truly meaningless.  Yesterday's offensively-challenged INT-fest was a prime example.  Cal was the lowest-seeded Pac-12 team, while TCU was tied with Baylor for lowest-seeded Big-12 team.  Not a significant match-up.  There's no rivalry, no past history, no narrative to make this more than two teams from the lower-middle tier of their conferences.  That said, it's not less significant than a typical regular season game; but bowl games are supposed to be something on a higher level (ostensibly).    

On point two, the outcomes of these games lack significance from a couple of perspectives.  The winner does not advance to a further round; there's no division or conference championship on the line; and, um, a W does not further the quest for bowl-eligibility (just had to throw that in there).  Now with more and more players sitting out the games, a further dimension of meaning has slipped away.  If teams increasingly enter these contests at diminished strength, what does it mean to beat Stanford or Pitt?  ASU most likely lost its game because of Harry's decision to skip the post-season. 

My overall dissatisfaction with the NCAA FBS post season is that there seem to be more and more meaningless match-ups; and the outcomes of these match-ups are declining in significance, particularly with the new trend for players to skip the post-season.  All in all, not a good trend.