It used to be that players would never skip a college football bowl game and only miss it if injured. Playing a bowl was a reward for a long regular season. However, a fairly new trend has seen some players likely to be chosen in the first couple of rounds of the next NFL Draft skipping out on bowl games to prepare for workouts with NFL teams. Two bowl games on Saturday have seen major defections.

Odds courtesy of OddsShark.com

The first bowl of the day is the Birmingham Bowl and features Memphis, a runner-up in the American Athletic Conference, facing Wake Forest of the ACC. The Demon Deacons are 3-point underdogs, a number the likely would have been bigger if star Tigers running back Darrell Henderson wasn’t skipping the bowl game.

The All-American and Doak Award finalist led the nation in all-purpose yards (2,328), total touchdowns (25) and in yards per carry (8.92, minimum of 125 carries). He was 10th in the Heisman voting. Memphis, playing Wake for the first time since 1967, has a good No. 2 in Patrick Taylor, who rushed for 1,012 yards and 15 scores. The Tigers have covered their past five as favorites.