Everyone’s been laughing at the Pro Bowl for a long time, and apparently NFL players have too. This Tuesday, NFL Media announced that Tyler Huntley has been called up to replace Josh Allen during the Pro Bowl.
Huntley this season is 6 games, 67% completed passes for 658 yards, 2 touchdowns and 3 interceptions.
How Lamar Jackson’s understudy ends up at what’s supposed to be the league’s best players reunion.
Well, the answer is to be found on the side of the players. Because the “alternates” of the Pro Bowl, ie those who will be called in the event of a package, is only the result of a vote by the players.
The replacements chosen by the players at quarterback were: Tua Tagovailoa, Trevor Lawrence, Lamar Jackson and Tyler Huntley. Josh Allen, Patrick Mahomes and Joe Burrow were the starters.
Mahomes is going to play the Super Bowl, Allen is forfeited, Tagovailoa still injured, just like Lamar Jackson. Burrow and Lawrence therefore find themselves in the front line, with Huntley who finds himself parachuted into the role of the third man.
Why did the players vote for him even though he had only started two games at the time of the vote? By friendship? To avoid giving votes to another incumbent who would have deprived a teammate of a place? To make a joke? Mystery. But it is at least the proof that the votes of the trophies by the journalists do not only have bad sides.
The worst thing is that there were not many other options in AFC. Justin Herbert also had surgery. Russell Wilson is coming off a cataclysmic season. Derek Carr or Mac Jones would then have been candidates.
As a reminder, the Pro Bowlers will face each other this year in a Flag Football game on Sunday, February 5 in Las Vegas.
