Look - people here on CB complain about all kinds of things. Including some who have complained about not wanting BYU to have ongoing contracts tying them to one single bowl game. Many of the bowl games themselves prefer to be tied to a conference - because then they'll get a variety of teams and due to the contract they are also much much less likely to be scrambling trying to find teams to play their game.

Reality is that as an independent - the best situation for BYU is to contract bowl appearances with ESPN, as the owner of multiple bowls (14, if I remember correctly), this gives BYU the best opportunity to be in a variety of bowls - and typically the quality of the bowl will be at least somewhat determined by their performance that year.

Also reality - if BYU isn't in a conference, the only way they're getting into a really big bowl game is if they go undefeated and make it into the playoffs or a NY6 or something.

I get that being independent isn't necessarily ideal if you want to play in the biggest bowl games. But what is happening now doesn't change anything from what we've been experiencing as an independent. The OP was essentially saying that to be in a bowl, you'll have to join a conference. That hasn't been true - and is unlikely to be true going forward. ESPN may lose some of their bowls - but they aren't closing all 14. No way. And if they continue to contract with BYU as an independent - and if that contract includes BYU going to a bowl game - then I'm completely comfortable in believing that BYU will have bowl game access.