Fiesta Bowl: Is It Dollars or Sense, or Both? : Miami, Penn State Opt for Jan. 2 Game on Prime-Time TV

Politics, paranoia and, ultimately, what even a rival network executive said was a brilliant idea, all figure in this season’s impromptu playoff, a just-arranged national championship football game between top-ranked Miami and second-ranked Penn State, the circumstances of which defy tradition if not good sense.

What we have here, by way of corporate sponsorship and network ingenuity and other elements new to college football, is a mini-tournament outside the customary four major bowls. The night after New Year’s Day. On prime-time TV. In Arizona.

You’ve gotta admit, network TV hasn’t enacted so outlandish a dream since Bobby Ewing was filmed taking a shower. Just about anything, apparently, can happen on a Friday night.

It has been more than a dream for the Fiesta Bowl, though, a one-time minor bowl newly prepared to challenge the big boys. Fiesta, its juice sweetened by Sunkist, has in fact been talking of just such a championship matchup for months, ever since the two schools, independent of bowl affiliations, began rising to their undefeated prominence.

But few really believed that Miami, no matter how swayed by the $2.4-million pay-out bid by Fiesta, would cut its ties of loyalty to the Orange Bowl and actually leave the state. If Miami was to flout tradition and meet Penn State, it was oft speculated, it would be in the equally independent Citrus or Gator Bowls, two others in the bidding and, more important, in the state.

Here’s what happened to make college football history:

--In a once-in-a-generation development, teams without conference affiliations elbowed their way to the top. Although Miami is often seen on its home field in postseason play, it has no agreement to return. Penn State is similarly a free-lancer when it comes to bowl games.

--The Fiesta Bowl, intent on reaching parity with the Rose, Sugar, Cotton and Orange bowls, acquired a sponsor willing to match the traditional bowls’ pay-outs of $2 million and more per team.

--The Fiesta Bowl saw a way to showcase a national championship game far from the madding crowd on New Year’s Day, when six bowl games compete for attention. NBC, which was going to have to vie for viewers with the Cotton Bowl in direct competition and with the Citrus and Sugar bowls in overlaps, was more than happy to preempt its Friday night entertainment fare for a national championship game.

--Miami found a way to take the money and run without severing any of its ties with the Orange Bowl.

--And, Penn State was in no position to argue.

This all came to a head, though in strict secrecy, last Wednesday when the Fiesta Bowl called Miami Athletic Director Sam Jankovich and said it was considering a Jan. 2, prime-time TV package.

“I asked Coach (Jimmy) Johnson about it and told him I liked it,” Jankovich said Monday. “He concurred. But I told him that it had to be very confidential because the Fiesta people didn’t know if they could pull it off.”

The Fiesta people, meanwhile, approached NBC and got a qualified approval. “Assuming an undefeated Miami and Penn State,” reported Fiesta Bowl spokesman Tony Alba.

Miami was equally interested in a qualifier before committing itself to the bowl. “We were really excited about the prime-time aspect, but only providing we and Penn State remained undefeated,” Jankovich said. “We needed the chance to come back to the Orange Bowl.”

The Orange Bowl, which pays $2.1 million, was not an attractive prospect, its site notwithstanding, because it appeared that Oklahoma, as Big Eight champion, would be the invited team. Miami had already beaten Oklahoma, soundly, and Johnson isn’t interested in a rematch.

On the other hand, if Nebraska beat Oklahoma, and Penn State lost, Miami wanted the option of returning to play the Cornhuskers. In any event, it didn’t want to appear committed with games to play.

At a reception for bowl representatives and media Friday night, Jankovich, talking with both Fiesta and Orange Bowl representatives, outlined his needs.

The Orange Bowl, perhaps mindful that the Fiesta was a preferable alternative to rival Citrus upstate, signaled acceptance. If Miami had to play in the Orange Bowl, the door remained open. If it was able to play for a national championship elsewhere, it could go to Tempe, Ariz., and play on a non-conflicting day in a non-conflicting bowl.

Jankovich said that with the Cotton Bowl and Sugar Bowl dimming as viable options--Texas A&M; had lost again and the Sugar Bowl likewise would feature a team with two losses--the Fiesta Bowl “was what we were talking about.”

For conspiracy fans, it is worthwhile to evoke the Citrus element at this point. Jankovich said that the Citrus, despite its ability to top the Fiesta pay-out with a bid of $2.6 million, was not an attractive option because it couldn’t handle so large a contingent of national press and couldn’t showcase the game on Jan. 2 in prime time.

The Citrus people weren’t buying it. The central Florida bowl was convinced that the Orange Bowl was telling Miami to leave the state if it was leaving Miami. Larry Guest, in the Orlando Sentinel, reported that Orange Bowl President Stan Marks was willing to “use any power at their disposal, including political pressure, to keep tourist rival Orlando from landing” the game.

Said Chuck Rohe, executive director of the Citrus Bowl: “Obviously, the Orange Bowl hears the Citrus Bowl’s footsteps.”

Added Manny Garcia of the Citrus Bowl: “I think we underestimated how many enemies we have within the Orange Bowl. During the next few years, I’m gonna work my butt off to get our payoff even with the Orange Bowl.”

This theory has its appeal, but prime-time exposure--”a brilliant idea,” said an ABC executive--was probably the dominant factor in Miami’s decision to switch dates and bowls. It’s what everybody wants, anyway, at least according to a CBS phone-in poll Saturday that found 93% of the 40,129 fans voting preferred a game that would determine a national champion. Jankovich was no doubt mindful of this contingent when he made the decision.

He was to have two meetings with Johnson before sounding out the team on the decision, but Johnson jumped the gun when the Hurricanes beat Tulsa Saturday. He took the seniors into a back room immediately after the game and, with Jankovich, outlined the options.

“Let’s do it,” was the response, according to Jankovich.

All of this strikes some folks as premature. First, Penn State could lose to Pitt and Miami could lose to East Carolina. Not likely, but possible. Second, it is not possible for a bowl, under NCAA rules, to extend a bid until this Saturday. Third, who said the Fiesta Bowl could switch dates?

Well, the NCAA is not likely to say it can’t.

Bob Minnix, of the NCAA Bowl Committee, said that there will probably be some interesting discussions next year when the roles of sponsorship and bowl dates are considered. But, as for the Fiesta swapping days, there’s not likely to be a problem for now.

“Nothing’s written in black and white that prohibits it,” he said. “On the other hand, we do have the expectation, that if there’s an alteration in the (bowl) certification, we expect the bowl to notify us of change.”

The Fiesta Bowl has not done so, and probably won’t until it can officially announce its bid for a Miami-Penn State game. For one thing, the whole package is contingent on those teams being undefeated. Once that is established, it will go ahead with the procedure.

Final approval by a bowl committee, which is already concerned about the New Year’s Day glut, is expected to be routine.

So the major bowls are left to squeal about bidding, likening it to prostitution every chance they get, and otherwise moan about this new notion of free enterprise.

The minor bowls, with ambitions similar to the Fiesta Bowl, are left to kick themselves. By the time ABC and the Citrus could come up with the idea of prime-time TV --they came up with it Sunday morning--an NBC deal had already been struck. “Thank you very much,” Jankovich told ABC.

The two best football teams, meanwhile, will very likely get to play the season’s most logical game, a game that tradition would never have permitted on its schedule.

What’s more, more people will be able to see it than at any other time this season. And if you don’t like it, well, you can watch Bobby Ewing come back to life in a shower stall. They said that was only a dream, too.