RIP NFL Pro Bowl: Will You Miss It, or Good Riddance???

The NFL is killing the Pro Bowl games, and the room could not agree on whether to applaud or pour one out.

Bobby Bones was ready to clap. TJ needed a minute to process.

The tug-of-war is gone. The three-legged race is gone. The potato sack event is gone. Bones landed on the analogy that explains his position entirely.

"You know what it felt like? The Scholastic book fair back in the day," he said. A whole event assembled in the library to sell you bookmarks.

That detour produced the segment's best tangent, which was Pizza Hut's Book It program and the personal pan pizza waiting at five stars.

"That's how I used to eat," TJ said.

Chris was more sentimental about it, and he made the strongest defense available. He enjoyed the games. The flag football was cool. The modified quarterback challenge was a real callback for anyone who grew up on the original. It was a fun attempt.

His broader point is that all-star games are pointless now across every sport, and that this is not really the players' fault. The money is too large to risk injury or embarrassment. But the Pro Bowl used to be awesome, and losing it is a little sad.

"Did it though?" came the pushback.

Chris held the line with one name. Sean Taylor blowing up a punter remains one of the great moments in NFL history.

TJ located the actual nostalgia, which was never about the game. When you are 12 or 13, you are not watching football. You are watching Peyton Manning throw a touchdown to Randy Moss, which is not a thing that happens anywhere else.

He also approves of the compromise. Players still get named Pro Bowlers, still get the bonuses written into their contracts, and nobody needs to be replaced simply to be honored.

Which brought up the replacements, and this is where the segment turned into an indictment.

Joe Flacco was a Pro Bowler last season, replacing Josh Allen, at 1-5.

"That was a lifetime achievement Pro Bowl," someone offered. "Congratulations. You didn't break a hip."

Also on the list: a replacement for Drake Maye, Tee Higgins in for Zay Flowers, which drew no objection, and Tyler Warren in for Brock Bowers. Shedeur Sanders has the star next to his name for last year, and Tyler Huntley the year before. Somebody raised Mac Jones in defense of nothing in particular and got told, with receipts, that Jones had a considerably better rookie season.

The joke of the week, which the internet got to first, is that Sanders made one Pro Bowl and they killed the whole thing.

TJ then extended the argument somewhere more serious, which is the Olympics.

"I don't want my guys playing flag football," he said. Not in the Pro Bowl version, not in the Olympic version. He wants the gold medal. He is happy for other teams to supply the roster.

The comparison that made his point was the slam dunk contest, which used to be bigger than the All-Star game and worth waiting a month for. Spud Webb winning at 5-7 because nobody had ever seen anything like it. Dominique Wilkins becoming a brand out of an Atlanta team that was otherwise forgettable. Dee Brown on the cover of Sports Illustrated, with the Reebok Pump on the bottom of his shoe.

All of that mattered then. None of it matters now. The Pro Bowl is going the same way, and Bones thinks bowl games are next.

His fix for those is genuinely interesting: play them at the beginning of the season, when they would actually matter.

The obvious objection is how you seed them, since bowls are promised to conferences by finish. Bones' answer was preseason rankings, who cares, and the ACC versus SEC challenge model from college basketball. We already know roughly which 60 teams are in the mix. Send out invites, let people accept, play the games, then enjoy the whole year and go straight into the playoff.

The only reason it will not happen, as everyone at the desk acknowledged, is money.

He would also get rid of conference championship games, on the same logic he applied to the Olympics. If two teams are already locks for the playoff, he does not want to play that game, and expects to see players sitting out.