2010 Pro Bowl – Whose Vote is it Anyway?

Courtesy ESPN

The Pro Bowl just holds so many amorous memories for Bronco fans. Clinton Portis’ last game as a Bronco, Rod Smith dirty hit by Roy Williams (even at the Pro Bowl Roy is still a dirty player), Mike Shanahan looking like a baseball glove, Jay Cutler playing like Peyton Manning destroyed the only insulin pump on the island, and of course Brandon Marshall dropped touchdown pass… oh the fond memories.

For several years now it’s been an honor to be voted to and play in the Pro Bowl. Despite television ratings, players have always loved to take a vacation down to Hawaii and play in a sort of touch football game with the best of the best. Now vacation is in Miami and nobody wants to party… well nobody who was voted that is. There has been a total of 30 replacements to this year’s Pro Bowl roster (14 for the AFC, 16 for the NFC), and it seems like more are being added every day.

Some of these additions are due to injuries and some are replacements for those playing in the Super Bowl the following week. It seems though that some players are just passing on this year’s “all-star” game. The Pro Bowl is losing whatever prestige it has left. It’s insane to hear that all three of the AFC quarterbacks playing this year’s Pro Bowl are all alternates. Not to take away anything from Matt Schuab who completely deserves this distinction, but David Garrard? Garrard wasn’t much of a pro-bowler at 15 touchdowns and 10 interceptions. One could even argue that Kyle Orton deserves a go instead.

On the other side of the spectrum a deserving player like Redskins linebacker London Flecther finally gets his due. Fletcher is considered to be quite undersized for a middle linebacker at 5’10, 245 pounds. However, Fletcher has had over a hundred tackles since 2001 for three different teams. In his past three seasons for the Redskins Fletcher has accumulated 403 total tackles. The only other players rack that many tackles up at his position in the past three years are John Beason (419), and Patrick Willis (467). Not to make things painful for you Broncos fans, but Shanahan passed over Beason and traded up for Jarvis Moss instead. Beason was drated at 25th overall the same year when Denver traded up to the 17th overall pick on Moss. (Another dagger to Denver in the 2007 draft is that Pro Bowler LaMarr Wooley was passed on for Tim Crowder, who is no longer on the team.)

The only brilliance of this situation is that this Pro Bowl might actually be watched. I’ve always suffered the withdraw of my NFL addiction that lonesome week before the Super Bowl so I’m sure to tune in. Whatever happened to the contests they held a day or two before? The NFL’s fastest and strongest man, best hands, best arm, or best whatever. Those tournaments made it worth watching the Pro Bowl.

My (rhetorical) question is, why does the NFL even give the fans a chance to vote if over a third of the players voted in (35%) don’t even go? Also, why does the NFL let the players vote when somehow Troy Polamalu recieves an overwhelmingly amount of the vote this year despite the fact he only played in five games?

What about you Bronco nation? Will you actually be watching the Pro Bowl this year? With Doom and Marshall possibly going into restricted free agency it could be their last game for Denver.