Shannon Sharpe is not taking the Pro Bowl’s death lightly.
The NFL announced Wednesday it was finally ending the all-star game, opting to bestow a title on players instead of having them risk injury in an exhibition.
Sharpe, an eight-time Pro Bowler during his Hall of Fame tight end career, compared the loss of the game element to the NBA’s troubles with its All-Star Game.
“You saw with the NBA, Adam Silver says, ‘Okay, if you all don’t start playing we’re going to cut it out. We done tried everything. It was the East vs. the West, then we let LeBron [James] and we let KD [Kevin Durant] and we let Giannis [Antetokounmpo], we let them select the squad, we let Steph [Curry] and Bron select the squad, you all still wouldn’t play. We tried it like this and you all still wouldn’t play’,” he said on his “Nightcap” podcast on Thursday night. “Adam Silver said, ‘You’re heading for a situation where there ain’t going to be no All-Star Game. And do you want to be the one?’
“And you NFL players that’s responsible for this that played the last decade, you ought to be embarrassed. Because something that’s been going on before your parents were born, you all ruined it. You ended it. Y’all did. Y’all did that. So be proud of yourself. Because that’s what you’ve done.”
During Sharpe’s playing days — 1990-2003 — the Pro Bowl was a star-studded event cloaked with respect. In recent years, it’s become something of a farce.
Numerous big-name players opt out in the name of risk mitigation — injury and otherwise — with the NFL turning a second tier of stars to fill in the gaps — Giants tackle Jermaine Eluemunor called the Pro Bowl “laughable” last season after Browns QB Shedeur Sanders made it despite playing in just eight games as a rookie with seven touchdowns to 10 interceptions on his ledger.
The league has also futzed with format of the game, introducing a weeklong skills competition and flag football game in 2023.
“It’s gotten so bad, they don’t even wear pads for the Pro Bowl,” Sharpe’s “Nightcap” co-host Chad Johnson, a six-time Pro Bowler himself, opined.
“They turn it into flag football because the players don’t want to compete. They they they they they don’t they don’t I mean, it’s it’s so different from the time when me and [Sharpe] went to the Pro Bowl. During those times, we actually played for real. We play we played for real. They they just they might as well have on flags and obviously to turn into a flag football game and it’s just way the NFL just wasting money. They just wasting money.”
