The smaller audiences for the Fiesta, the Orange and the Peach may demonstrate that the bowls that are not in the semifinals each year will suffer because they lack major importance.

Some thoughts on the games:

■ With Florida State about to fall behind, 59-20, against Oregon, the ESPN analyst Kirk Herbstreit declared unequivocally that the Seminoles had “quit” and had “shut down the operation.” That was a fairly strong accusation about the defending national champions. But in a telephone interview Friday, Herbstreit did not back off his criticism or say that he had been hyperbolic.

“It was a combination of what they were facing — incredible tempo and confusion, and they had held up as long as they could,” he said. “Their offense self-destructed with four turnovers, and, being a fan and knowing these teams, I could see a different energy level in that team after those turnovers. You saw it in their body language, and a little less effort, and they shut down.”

■ Brad Nessler and Todd Blackledge, ESPN’s Sugar Bowl announcers, were operating at different levels of speed and efficiency. Nessler was laid-back to the point of near-somnolence (or boredom), while Blackledge was quick with informed analysis that suggested he could have worked alone. Nessler’s performance led to a small campaign on Twitter from fans wishing Brent Musburger were there instead. I’ve never been a fan of Musburger’s, but he brings a big-game style and is entertaining enough to make people miss him now that he’s off the big-game roster. He called the Orange Bowl this week.

Nessler also made mistakes. He mispronounced Ohio State quarterback Cardale Jones’s given name — it’s car-DALE, which sometimes sounds like car-DELL, but definitely not Kordell — until late in the first quarter, when a Buckeyes official informed ESPN otherwise. Nessler also declared a first down for Ohio State after a 12-yard gain on a third-and-20 play and seemed overly enamored of the phrase “off to the races.”

Someone more eager and exciting in the ESPN stable — Sean McDonough? — should have such an important assignment.

■ For the seven games on New Year’s Eve, Jan. 1 and Jan. 12, ESPN has split its corner score box into two parts: a box with the teams and the score on the bottom right side of the screen, and the name of the bowl and its major sponsor, and the ESPN logo, on the top left side. It would be better if ESPN reintegrated them into one, rather than have a near-constant presence in two corners. Also, I’d prefer that ESPN silence the mooing cow that accompanies the “impact players” graphic feature sponsored by the Peach Bowl’s sponsor, Chick-fil-A. I like cows. I like mooing. I liked Phil Rizzuto. I don’t like mooing cows in my playoffs.

■ The WatchESPN app was inoperative for about an hour during the first half of the Rose Bowl — an awful time for a serious problem with its servers — but it still drew 816,000 unique streaming viewers, a figure that swelled to 912,000 for the Sugar Bowl.