Coming soon to a stadium near you: The Grumman Bowl!

Or something like that. The Washington Convention and Sports Authority, which runs RFK Stadium, has just scheduled a news conference for tomorrow to “announce new name and presenting sponsor” for the college football bowl game it has held at RFK at the end of the last two seasons.  

That means EagleBank is out! This bums me terribly.

Nothing about the game intrigued me nearly as much as the sponsor. Shortly after EagleBank paid scads of money to put its name on what was billed as “the first college bowl game in D.C. history” in 2008, it came out that Eagle Bancorp Inc. took $38.2 million from the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP).

 That was George W. Bush’s $700 billion gift to financial-services companies.  

 EagleBank, a Bethesda-based chain with 15 area branches, shortly thereafter announced that profits were down 26 percent for the fourth quarter of 2008, but after taking the people’s money EagleBank doled out $2 million worth of bonuses to its bosses.

But, thanks to the people’s money, it still had enough scratch lying around to throw a football game. In fairness to the organizers, in its brief existence the game managed to please fans and sponsors despite matchups of sub-mediocre college football squads.

So, with the TARP-taker gone, who’s gonna be the new sponsor? I haven’t heard any rumblings. But, based on nothing but a lifetime spent inside the Beltway and occasionally noticing who buys all the ad space in Politico, I say look for a military contractor.

The Bomb Bowl has a nice ring to it, also.