Bowl update: Yuma can learn from good and bad

At long last, Saturday is the Heart of Texas Bowl, and that could mean only one thing.

It's only one year until the Time Warner Cable presents the Caballero Bowl. Or whatever the second half of the bowl name ends up being - the first half is set.

Yes, Yuma is a year away from hosting a bowl game. Next year, the Matadors will not have to travel to Mississippi or Texas, but instead have the luxury of playing at home.

The Caballeros de Yuma organization is helping to put on the event. And they want to showcase Yuma.

From all reports, there was plenty of positive about the Mississippi Bowl, which AWC went to in Biloxi, Miss. last year. Plenty of organized activities and things to do.

This year, however, there seems to be a dearth of things for the players to occupy themselves with.

Now be warned, this is not coming from anyone I talked to. Just a general feeling I've picked up out here over the last two days. Everyone is very pleased with the facilities and impressed how HOT officials were at the airport to greet them.

But as for organzied activites, that seems to be a little light. Each school spoke at an elementray school as a community service project, but only about a dozen Matadors went. There's also a banquet tonight for both teams. And then the game.

And again, this isn't a slam on Copperas Cove officials. But AWC officials have painted a picture that seems to involve non-stop things to do for players and fans.

(Note: I wonder if the sausage fry is included. The biggest draw back to coming here, other than being away from my daughter for longer than I've ever been before, is that I missed the sausage eating contest. I guess I could try to down five sausage kolaches as a make good, but it's just not the same.)

I think from both bowls, Caballero and Matador officials have garnered plenty of information. We'll see if 12 months from now a blogger from Kansas is complaining about Yuma.