When you are watching the College Football Playoff semifinal at the Rose Bowl between Alabama and Michigan, you may hear the game referred to as The Granddaddy Of Them All.
The Rose Bowl is so steeped in history that its legacy gives it an extremely unique nickname created by one of America’s favorite broadcasters.
Why Is the Rose Bowl Known as “The Granddaddy Of Them All?”
The Granddaddy Of Them All is the nickname given to the Rose Bowl by the late great broadcaster Keith Jackson.
Jackson is so synonymous with the Rose Bowl that there is a statue of him outside of the stadium. He is so encapsulated in Rose Bowl history that he was enshrined in the Rose Bowl Hall of Fame in 1999 as the first member of the media to enter.
He spent more than half a century broadcasting before he put down the microphone after the 2006 Rose Bowl between USC and Texas. In total, Jackson called 15 different Rose Bowls in his career.
He got his first broadcasting gig in 1952, broadcasting Washington State games on the radio before quickly being elevated to national TV. He became one of the nation’s favorite voices, and he is missed by many after his passing in 2018.
Naming the Rose Bowl The Granddaddy Of Them All isn’t the only nickname that Jackson provided that has caught on. He is also credited with coining Michigan Stadium, The Big House. Whoa, Nellie! and Big Uglies are also some of the other famous expressions that Jackson created.
He invented the phrase, The Granddaddy Of Them All, because of the status that the Rose Bowl holds. It is seen as the most iconic of college football games, and its popularity has been copied and replicated by other bowl games across the nation.
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It can be reproduced, but no one does it better than the Rose Bowl.
The history of the Rose Bowl dates so far back that it was the first-ever postseason game. At that point, it wasn’t known as the Rose Bowl, it was “The Tournament East-West football game” held at the “Tournament of Roses.” It colloquially became known as the Rose Bowl in the 1920s with the opening of the Rose Bowl Stadium.
Its increasing and withstanding popularity saw the expansion of other bowl games right across America as others tried to replicate its accomplishment.
While other bowl games are successful and are also historic, nothing compares to the stature and legacy of the iconic bowl game.
Traditionally, the Rose Bowl is competed between the champions of the Big Ten and Pac-12 but since the inception of the national championship, it has occasionally had to stray away from this formula.
The 2024 edition is one of those years with the playoff semifinal between Alabama and Michigan being held at the Rose Bowl. It is poised to be the next installment in the history of this special event.
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