Nobody is travelling to 3 consecutive bowl games.
That's why I like my initial proposal, reduce bowls, and make the selection criteria both for inclusion and tiers mandatory.
Everyone always says "if you don't like the extra bowls, don't watch them." Except, it makes the regular season meaningless, once you are out of the CFP race. If you are even halfway decent, you make a bowl, so bowl selection doesn't matter. Plus, bowl selection is based on moving teams around, and eyeballs, so it's not like winning extra games puts you in a better bowl.
This makes getting to a bowl something more selective, and each better bowl, by definition, more elite. So, how do you make them "matter"? So I've got 5 tiers of bowls. The top tier doubles as a quarterfinals. No need to add incentive there. What if winning a Tier 2 bowl earns you an extra scholarship, or 4. Tier 3 = 3. Tier 4 = 2. Tier 5 = 1. I'd care a whole lot then. Or you also tiered the payouts, and that money didn't go into some conference pot, or to the school. It went directly into your schools NIL fund?
Still wouldn't fix the opt out situation, but I'm thinking out loud here