The Pro Bowl Is No More

The Pro Bowl has been around since 1951. For nearly all of those 70+ years, it was a fun way to end the NFL season. It was fun until the modern football player turned the annual all-star game into a joke. The effort put forth by the players over the past decade made walk-throughs look like the Super Bowl. It was embarrassing and the NFL had seen enough. 

Enter the “Pro Bowl Games.” 

A flag football game will replace whatever it was that the players were doing in pads. That game will take place in Las Vegas at Allegiant Stadium on Sunday, February 5, 2023. Hopefully that field will be in excellent shape. It’d be wild if the league re-imagines their half-century old all-star game to make it safer and joints are ruined while scampering around on a shitty field. 

The flag football game will be the culmination of a week of football fun. And games. There will be a week of skills competitions and games. There will be precision passing and best catch competitions. Races. Maybe Micah Parsons can beat Tyreek Hill again. That was a twist. There will also be the always fun dodge ball game. Other fun competitions are sure to be added. 

I get that this change was inevitable. The Pro Bowl game as it’s been played for too long could not continue. It was a joke. The NFL looked like a joke for continuing with it. The problem that I have with the game’s elimination is all about nostalgia. I grew up with the Pro Bowl and there was never an issue with effort. It was never the effort of even a mid-season game. It was never going to be. It was an all-star game. But it was a fun football game. The players of my youth cared about the Pro Bowl. They had a respect for the game. They wanted to win the game. They competed. It was a different time. I also don’t remember a player ever sustaining a significant injury in the game. Actually, the only significant Pro Bowl injury that I can recall was Tyler Eifert’s knee injury in 2016. Not only did that injury occur during the grab-ass days of the Pro Bowl, it was a fluky, non-contact injury that could easily happen in a flag football game. As player salaries skyrocketed, the effort put forth in the Pro Bowl plummeted. Unfortunately, change was necessary.