National Football League

Pro Bowl has plenty going for it

Published Jan. 27, 2011 12:00 a.m. ET

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OK, it’s true. The football purists are spot-on in their critique. The NFL Pro Bowl (FOX, 7 p.m. ET) is not a real football game. Of course it isn’t. You can’t play pro football at three-quarter speed. You can’t play pro football smiling. It’s true, this isn’t the real thing. This game has nothing to do with the Frozen Tundra. John Facenda surely never narrated Pro Bowl highlights to a swashbuckling instrumental score.

(And if he did, someone, please, destroy the evidence posthaste.)

But I love the Pro Bowl. I love it for what it is, instead. I love it for its impurity. I love it for its goofiness, for its weird-things-can-happen-here vibe. Where else could Peyton Manning finally let down his hair? In what other context would he publicly call someone a liquored-up idiot kicker?

(Liquored-up idiot kicker. Man, that’s poetry!)

I used to cover the Pro Bowl. I once stumbled into the locker room for the all-star mascots. And it was exactly like you would imagine the locker room for the all-star mascots. They wrestled. They sprayed “Febreeze” into their feathers and fur. They zinged each other. They told wild stories of grand adventures, most of which had happened to them only minutes ago. (The Detroit Lion had somehow found himself locked out of the stadium, shaking gates in his oversized-headed, big-pawed, hot and heavy lion suit.)

They were bitter, because somehow, their pre-game meal had never come.

"But you can bet Jessica Simpson gets her double-stuffed Oreos," the Jaguar said.

Ah, Jessica, goofy, pretty, fun. About to enter her “Is this chicken or is this fish?” phase. If ever a halftime performer captured the essence of an event …

I love the Pro Bowl. I love it for what it is, and what it isn’t. I love it because for one day a year, the guys on the field can afford to take things less than seriously, just once.

Let’s face it, the all-star players like everything about the Pro Bowl except for the actual game itself. Barry Switzer once ate a hot dog on the sidelines. Troy Aikman once left at halftime (hey, he had a plane to catch). But the players love the experience of hanging out together, as an elite fraternity of all-stars. They love Hawaii.

The game is huge for Hawaii, as a showcase, and as economic stimulus, too. The league has been a great partner for the state, that’s for sure — but it has gotten its money’s worth as well.

Hawaii saved this game, and propped it up, and then made it big-time again.

Big enough that the NFL could even experiment with another locale last season — in part to explore its options, in part to show that it could. (It never hurts to get a little leverage going into future negotiations — just ask DeMaurice “68 cents” Smith how that goes.)

But there’s something intoxicating about the location. You should see the parking lot, the sold-out stadium, zanily dressed super fans representing every team in the league.

And some of the biggest fans at the game are the guys on the field. I’ve seen them line up for autographs from Peyton Manning like fans, after practice. They do everything but ask him to chant “Cut that meat!”

After the game itself they swap memorabilia like geeks at an autograph show. They ask for jerseys. They trade helmets. (Leading to at least one case of confusion for a local TV reporter asking for a postgame interview: “Um, no, that’s not me. I just got his helmet.”)

In the end, they're all fans as they stuff their bags and head out into the night.

And sometime deep in the game, usually, a switch flips. There are still smiles. But they play. There are interceptions. The late Sean Taylor drills a punter into next Tuesday. Saints coach Sean Payton loses it over a Pro Bowl no-call.

(I was three feet from him in the locker room afterward, and he had a crazy look in his eye.)

“This,” Ed Reed once said, “is everything I thought it would be.”

And when it’s over, they smile, and hug, and trade helmets, shirts, shoes, anything. Every one of them, looking for stuff to swap with one another, like kids.

In the locker room in 2007, Taylor sat next to his fellow Miami Hurricane, Frank Gore, and asked to trade jerseys, to commemorate the moment.

“No,” Taylor said, changing his mind. Gore’s shirt was too special to take. “That’s your first one,” Taylor said. “You keep it.”

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