I remember seeing that game. A thunderstorm/monsoon hit during the third quarter and forced them to temporarily cease play for safety reasons. However, that didn’t stop thousands of thoroughly-tanked fans from immediately invading the field to play slip-and-slide on the water-soaked turf. Even though the storm passed, the situation on the field had gotten so completely out of control that they still decided to simply end the game. A few days after that debacle, they put the Chicago Charities College All-Star game out of its misery.
Well, the minimal effort part of the equation could only ever change if the League, the players, and the fans began to see the game itself as an important contest. And that just isn’t going to happen.
In Australia, the National Rugby League has an all-star game, called the State of Origin. In fact, it’s not a single game, but a best-of-three-game series. State of Origin games are generally among the most intense, most hotly-contested games of the year. The hits are huge, the game is non-stop, and the rivalries are intense. Injuries do happen.
Not only that, but the games are played mid-week, during the regular season, and the players often come back on the weekend to play for their clubs in the NRL competition.
The reason all this works is simply that everyone takes the State of Origin competition seriously. The League advertises it as a real contest, the players are incredibly competitive about being chosen for the team, and the fans tare rabid about supporting their team. It also helps that, as the name suggests, the competition is between players from the two states where most Australian rugby league players come from (New South Wales and Queensland), and the interstate rivalry adds flavor.
Star caliber players are not going to put their health and safety on the line on a meaningless game, no amount of fixing can change that. Either give the game some meaning, like a multi million per player purse for the winning team or forget it completely.
Scrap it. Scrap all the all star games. The fans don’t care, the players don’t care, fuck it.
The new setup is really dumb. An “all-star” game that doesn’t feature any players from the two best teams? Who thought that would be an improvement?
Baseball and perhaps basketball can have decent all-star games, simply because they focus on individuals. For baseball, it’s hitter vs. pitcher. The fielders have to work together, but it doesn’t take much practice to get up to speed with other players, especially at the all-star level.
Football and hockey are sports that require a lot of practice and teamwork. In football, a team spends most of the week learning how to work together (especially the defense). You can’t get that sort of familiarity for an all-star game, especially on defense.
And hockey often “solves” this problem by having teammates play on lines together since you need several close to equal playing time units unlike football.
Why and when was it started in the first place?
I believe baseball started the All-Star game to help the players fill their pension fund. That’s why they used to have two games for a while, until baseball realized that fans didn’t care that much about it to watch 2 games.
Football just doesn’t lend itself to a good game. Flag football would be interesting, but not to fill up a stadium full of beer drinking, money spending fans. I don’t know who in the hell watches the Pro-Bowl. Ever. I don’t remember the last one I saw highlights from. If people actually travel to this game each year, then wow. Just wow. I guess that’s the best reason to play in Hawaii.
bag it. Name the players all stars for their contract bonuses, HOF voting, and whatever else they get for being named to it, take the money that would be spent by sending players and their families to Hawaii and give it to Hawaii to help offset the tourism losses for 5 years, and that’s it. Time to put it to bed.
I kind of liked the hokey skills stuff they had in the '90s, especially the quarterback competitions.
It looks like the idea of an NFL all-star game first started in 1939, but then was suspended during WWII, and re-started (as the Pro Bowl) in 1951. No clue from this article if there was ever a charitable aspect to it.
Short answer: No.
Longer answer: Maybe Mooch’s or Oakminster’s ideas could possibly salvage an All-Star event.
I mean, what athelete wouldn’t want to come to Hawaii, attend parties with celebs, playstation Madden with Troy Polomalu and electric-buzzing football against Peyton Manning, do some silly lightly athletical activities (players vs coaches fast-pitch softball!), and end the weekend with a quick awards ceremony/banquet? But an actual professional tackle football game? Can’t see it.
[Of course, I want the whole Superstars concept revived, with Kobe Bryant taking on Landon Donovan in the hurdles and tire pull events. I think, with modern NFL sizes, the tug of war might have to be abandoned, but we can add some slightly goofy events, too. In my world, there would be a beer pong game. Or at least the dizzy-bat race.
I still like my nerf bats idea.
I like this idea. They could even make it a couple weeks earlier just to give the Probowlers a little more time to get back to work with their teams and/or heal from any dings along the way.
To me, getting into the Pro Bowl is a pretty big deal. Sure there is some chicanery going on with the voting, but essentially the people voted in can say “I’m one of the best middle linebackers or wide recievers or punters in the conference.” The game itself is prett blah though – for obvious reasons – so it’s not as fun to watch.
Moving it to Super Bowl week isn’t good, and maybe moving it away from Hawaii will take away some of the neat benefits of getting voted in – but make it in Canton, where the Pro Football hall of Fame is, in the company of legends, is a workable idea and something the NFL could market.
I say the winners of the ProBowl plays the winners of the Lingerie Bowl for the Fake Football Championship.
Been a long time supporter of simply selecting players to All-Pro Honors status for the season and letting it go at that. Sh*t-can the actual game
There are a few things that could be done to improve the Pro Bowl, but only a few, and even then the product wouldn’t be particularly attractive.
In baseball, an Albert Pujols doesn’t mind flying to, say, Cincinnati or Detroit to play 3 innings of an exhibition game. There’s no real work involved, and it may even be fun. At WORST, it’s just a waste of a few hours.
In basketball, Kevin Durant doesn’t mind flying to Vegas or New Orleans for an exhibition game. He gets to party a little, do some hot-dogging in a defense-free exhibition game, and hang out with some of his buddies.
The baseball and basketball players figure, “Hey, it’s the middle of the season. If I weren’t HERE at the All-Star Game, I’d be flying off to some other town to play another game. So really, this isn’t so bad.”
To a football player, it’s different. The Pro Bowl isn’t held in the middle of the season, it’s at the END of the season. At that point, everybody is exhausted and many of the best players are just coming off disheartening losses in the playoffs. Most players just want to go home, rest up, let their injuries heal, and then get back to training for next year. My guess is, right now, Tom Brady and Drew Brees would rather do anything than spend 12 hours flying to Hawaii and take part in a meaningless game. If and when they want to take a tropical vacation, they’re rich enough to do so ANY time.
What’s the upside of being in the Pro Bowl? it may be exciting for a rookie, or for a vet who’s been selected for the very first time. But for everyone else, it’s just an opportunity to get injured in a game nobody cares about.
AFAIK, There are usually bonus incentives built into players contracts for being named to the Pro Bowl
True enough, but so what? If the Pro Bowl game didn’t exist they’d easily find another performance measure to base a bonus payment on, such as making the all-pro team or something similar.
Also, i don’t know what the bonus incentives are like in football contracts, but if they’re anything like the ones in baseball contracts, they might be so small (compared to the player’s actual salary) that they’re basically worthless as incentives.
Prince Fielder just signed a deal for $15.5 million for next year with the Brewers. In addition to this salary, Fielder can earn an extra $100,000 if he wins the NL MVP award, and $50,000 if he’s voted to start the All-star Game.
Assuming Fielder plays every game in the regular season next year, he’s earning basically $100,000 every single time he steps onto the playing field. So, if he gets elected to the All-star team, he wins an extra half-day’s pay. Woohoo! While i’m sure that Fielder would love to be elected, i somehow don’t think that 50 grand will be his main motivation.
I was actually quite surprised at how low the MVP bonus was. To put it into more realistic proportions, imagine you were a mid-level corporate type earning $150,000 a year. And imagine that you had a year so good that you were voted the best in your job in your whole industry. And then imagine that, as a reward, you got a $1000 bonus. That’s pretty much what Fielder gets for winning MVP.
I’m not feeling sorry for him. He gets his reward in his $15.5 million salary. And he gets that salary even if he tears an ACL in his first at-bat of the season and never makes another plate appearance. It just seems to me that, with salaries so massive, a bonus like that is sort of pointless because it’s not big enough to create any incentive.
Maybe they should switch to the Oscar/Emmy/Grammy model. Make it an awards show. Create some categories (Best supporting kicker in an AFC team) and release a list of the nominees. Then have a show where the actual awards are announced live. Have the players come up and make speeches. Show clips of their greatest plays. Have past players hand out the awards. Check out their hot wives.