Why are football championship games called 'Bowl' games?
144186
An early and pivotal figure in the National Football league around the time the two leagues (NFL and AFL) merged, circa 1965, noticed his son playing with a large ball. He asked what it was called, and learned it was a "Super Ball", giving him the idea to call the early championship a Super Bowl. Other football events followed suit and called their championships "_________ Bowl".
911327
1st of all its different this year..the National Championship Game is not a bowl game...its Just the National Championship game played in Glendale Az. They will still have the normal bowl games as usual. And yes if they lose their bowl game they will drop in the final BCS standings  which will be released after all the Bowl Games and Championship game have been played.
168669
Let me clarify a few things that have been neglected to be cleared up.\n\nThe Super Bowl is the World Cup (for the soccer fans) of American Football.  The two best teams of American football (after going through and winning in a tournament style playoff - 10 teams play in the playoffs, whomever wins moves on, loser goes home) face off against each other to determine the best team in America.  \n\nThere's a lot of history - check out http://www.nfl.com for more details.\n\nIt's played in different cities every year - the officials of the NFL pick the city in advance. \n\nIt is played every year.  This is different than the World Cup which is played every 4 years, I believe.\n\nPeople do parties because it is one of the, if not THE, most popular sport to follow in America.  People cheer for their team if their team is in it, and there are gambling pools and because it's always on a Sunday, parties abound because people like to get together and watch sports, especially when it's a game of national importance.
721807
Because the entire world (with the exception of the USA) calls it football, maybe.  You use your feet, so "FOOTball," get it?
753205
Too many marginal programs make too much money and get a vast majority of their national exposure from the Bowl system. These teams like Missouri, Arizona State, Arkansas, and unfortunately my alma mater, Minnesota, schedule cupcakes for their non-Conference games in order to get the 6 wins that it takes to get into a bowl game. They do this year after year and hope for one really good year, like Arkansas this year, to placate their fans. They get the big bowl game check and laugh all the way to the bank.
547409
The reason it is called Football is it was origonally played using the foot. Early on in American Football, they did not Pass the football. The primary methods of advancing the ball was the running play, Drop Kick and the underhand toss(like Rugby). The Drop kick was simular to the punt and a receiver would run down the field and try to catch it. The reason for not passing was the shape of the football. More like a Rugby ball it was very difficult to hold in one hand. \n\nWhen the League changed the shape of the football, close to the shape of todays College balls, the forward pass was born. Not by plan, but in desperation. The play went bad and the handoff to the Fullback didn't happen. The Quarterback wanted to get rid of the ball so he wouldn't be sacked for a loss of yards. He overhand threw the ball to another player on his team, who advanced the ball several yards. Since there was no rule against this technique, it was allowed to stand, and the Forward Pass we know today, was born.
935687
There are 31 bowl games. Check out "College Football Bowl Games" on the internet. This year the Fiesta Bowl is reserved for the "National Championship." Where a team is from has little bearing on which bowl they play in. There used to be bowls that had contracts with 2 conferences but the BCS has ruined that.
751041
It means they pick the best game like the best macthup and they put it on sunday night. SO instead of having boring 1-8 teams playing youll have an interesting macthup.
849495
No.  That's the nature of a championship game.  Football isn't a game of endless series and rematches; you win or you lose, then on to the next challenge.
583635
Lets see according to Ocean Staff competition means sport so a political party vs another political party to win an election is a sport.  The race to be the first in space was a Sport!!!.  The only reason Poker and Chess (which by the way are games of skill) are called sports is because they are broadcast on ESPN and ESPN II.  Why do you think that Spelling Bees are now called Sport.  Here are some more things that should be called Sport:\n\nBridge\nCanasta\nWhisk\nEuchre\nGo Fish\nCheckers\nParchissi\nMonopoly\nClue\nOperation\nHopscotch\nAny video game\n\nAnyway you get my point, competition by itself does not make sport, sport requires more than a battle between persons, places or things.  I cannot give it a definite explanation but I am sure that some of the people in this Yahoo Answer arena can.  By the way since we compete for best answer is this Yahoo Answer a Sport??
1103121
American Football (as this category relates to) is the style the play in the NFL, colleges, high schools, etc.  The Football that this question relates to is known as Soccer in the states.  As such, this question was placed in the wrong section.
974602
You can pretty much call it anything when your championship game is watched by more people than any other sports championship game.\n\nCoach
101690
National football league.  However, if you are a coach in it... it probably means "Not For Long" for you=)
113109
The superbowl is the championship game for American football.
136
- The bowls came first and have to be dislodged\n\n- The bowl organizers control larges amounts of money.  Some of these monies are given to participating universities and their conferences. Bowl organizers do not want to risk lossing this money. And universities who frequent bowls want to be assured of still receiving the big bucks before switching. Hence bowl organizers are generally against playoffs and univerisities are only luke warm supporters.\n\n- Universities like to believe their players are really students (some actually are) and not semi-professional atheletes, so they limit the number of games per year.  Playing a game takes a lot of the players time preparing and practicing.  Also due the physical nature of the game, players need several days to recovery.  This limits games to about one every 5 days or so (about one a week). A playoff system would require the two teams meeting for the championship to play and additional 2-4 games depending on the number of teams allowed to participate in the playoffs.
165619
It's not uncommon for one or two major games a year to be played on Sundays, especially at the beginning of the season when the NFL hasn't really started up yet. I remember a Purdue game last year, and I thought there was at least one other one.
832213
Im not sure what teams normally get to play in those bowls.  They are very popular bowl games though so i would probably guess a team like southcarolina and pittsburg if they are bowl elegiable.