One year ago this month, I opined about taxpayers footing the bill for several college football bowl games. I decided to revisit the college football bowl scene and find out who’s sponsoring this year’s post-season gridiron clashes.
Perhaps most surprising among my findings is the fact that a UAW-General Motors entity, the UAW-General Motors Human Resources, is listed here as a sponsor, alongside Ford and a few other organizations, of the Little Caesar’s Pizza Bowl (formerly known as the Motor City Bowl) to be played at Ford Field in Detroit Dec. 26.
This sponsorship deal makes me wonder how many football fans of the matchup between Marshall University and Ohio University will spend halftime visiting this sponsor’s exciting web site.
The Eagle Bank Bowl is set for Dec. 29 at RFK Stadium in Washington, D.C., and appears to be back stronger than ever in 2009. The bowl’s “strength”– not found in the battle between UCLA and Temple — could be due to the fact that it’s title sponsor, Bethesda, Md.-based Eagle Bancorp Inc., received $38.2 million via the Troubled Asset Relief Program, according to a Wall Street Journal report early this year. [Note: From the strange-but-true department, the name of the bank’s chairman and chief executive officer is — drumroll, please — Ron Paul.]
Judging by its web site, it appears no one but the federal government — which provided $3.55 billion in bailout funds to Capitol One — is helping the title sponsor of the Jan. 1 Capitol One Bowl pitting LSU against Penn State in Orlando. The good news: Over the summer, the bank paid back more than it received, according to this report.
The Detroit News reported last week that Motor City-based GMAC Inc., sponsor of the GMAC Bowl, could benefit from a bailout extension. To date, according to the newspaper, the company has received $13.5 billion in government support and has been in talks with the White House about an additional infusion of up to $5.6 billion. What might happen if an extension falls through before the Jan. 6 game between Troy and Central Michigan? Not much, I suspect.
Finally, after receiving a whopping $20 $25 billion in TARP funds, according to the aforementioned Journal report, Citigroup officials promised yesterday (see this article) they’re going to pay back $20 billion soon. Good for them!
As the title sponsor of both the Rose Bowl (Jan. 1) and the BCS National Championship (Jan. 7) in Pasadena, Citi should be expected to spare no expense when it comes to putting on a good show. At a minimum, they should buy the Oregon Ducks some decent-looking uniforms to wear as they take on Ohio State in the “granddaddy” of bowl games and give the Texas cheerleaders gold-plated shovels to clean up Bevo’s mess after he sees how many points Alabama has pasted on his Longhorns after 60 minutes.
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