NYE Is For Celebration & Partying, Not Watching Games
By Kevin Wilkerson, PubClub.com College Football Blogger
Playing the College Football Playoffs on New Year’s Eve is a dumb idea.
Period.
For fans of the teams involved, this means NYE will be spent in an anxious, tense mental state.
And after the games, while fans of the winning teams will be partying it up in a huge celebration, fans of the losing teams will be having a pin stuck in their party balloon.
Fans on both sides can’t really party for New Year’s Eve because they will be too intense watching the games. And the Alabama-Michigan State game is in prime time, meaning on the East Coat it’s still likely to be going on at the strike of midnight.
And from a marketing and PR perspective, having the games on NYE is a blunder. Is the rest of the country going to be watching – or even caring – about the games? No, people are going to be at bars, clubs, house parties or huge public celebrations like this one on the Las Vegas Strip.
The games may be on in the background of bars and house parties, but it’s not going to be the focal point of people’s attention. How do you think advertisers will feel about that, paying all that money and not having their pitches seen by the audience?
How did we get here? Well the Rose Bowl refused to move from its traditional New Year’s Day timeslot. So on New Year’s Day, instead of having college football take center stage when it has everyone’s attention, it has a bunch of meaningless bowl games.
The whole thing is ridiculous. The College Football Playoff Committee needed to stand its ground and play the games when the games should be played – on New Year’s Day.
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