The LA Bowl is finished after five years

The LA Bowl is done after just five years.

The bowl game announced Thursday it will no longer be played, ending a brief run at SoFi Stadium that featured Jimmy Kimmel as title sponsor, Rob Gronkowski as “host,” and a vomiting camel mascot that traumatized Laura Rutledge on live TV.

“After five great years, the LA Bowl at SoFi Stadium will no longer be moving forward,” the bowl wrote in a statement Thursday. “It has been an honor for our staff and volunteers to bring college football to one of the world’s greatest venues. We want to thank the athletes and football programs who participated and, most importantly, the college football fans who joined us over these past five seasons.”

The bowl was established in 2020 as part of Los Angeles Rams owner Stan Kroenke’s vision for SoFi Stadium. COVID-19 delayed the first game until December 2021, when it launched with Jimmy Kimmel as the title sponsor.

Awful Announcing wrote in June 2021 that Kimmel emphasized the sponsorship wasn’t a joke during his announcement on Jimmy Kimmel Live!, though viewers could be forgiven for thinking otherwise. Kimmel said he’d dreamed of having a college football bowl game named after him ever since he turned 52 the previous year. He made history as the first human being to have a bowl game named after him, paying an undisclosed amount for a multi-year partnership with SoFi Stadium.

The inaugural Jimmy Kimmel LA Bowl featured Utah State and Oregon State in a Saturday night game on ABC. Kimmel couldn’t remember who was playing when he appeared on Yahoo Sports’ College Football Enquirer podcast a week before the game, though he defended the sponsorship by pointing out there’s no sanctity when it comes to bowl game sponsors anymore.

After two years, Kimmel stepped away as sponsor. Rob Gronkowski took over as “host” in 2023, though what that meant was never clear. The game became the SoFi LA Bowl presented by Gronk for its final three editions.

Despite the quirks and the short lifespan, the LA Bowl performed well in viewership. The 2025 edition, in which Washington blew out Boise State 38-10, drew 3.8 million viewers, the best on record for the bowl and part of ESPN’s strong bowl season that saw several games post multi-year or all-time highs.

The game leaves behind a brief but memorable legacy. Where else would a vomiting camel mascot terrorize a sideline reporter while a late-night comedian played clarinet with a marching band? The Jimmy Kimmel LA Bowl leaned into the absurdity of modern bowl season, and for five years, it worked.

Then it didn’t, and now it’s gone.