This year, in an effort to add excitement to what normally is a lackluster game featuring all-star football players going through the motions, the National Football League elected to change the format of its annual Pro Bowl game. The traditional format featured the American Football Conference pitting its fan-selected all-stars against fan-selected all-stars from the National Football Conference. The new format featured the complete pool of fan-selected all-stars from both conferences being “drafted” by NFL Hall Of Famers Deion Sanders and Jerry Rice. Sanders’ team was coached by Indianapolis Colts head coach, Chuck Pagano, and Rice’s team was coached by Carolina Panthers coach, Ron Rivera. If nothing else, the game was very competitve, with Team Rice edging out Team Sanders with a 2-point conversion that was made with less than 2 minutes left in the game. The oddity of the game was that, because of the selection format, many of the players found themselves playing against members of their own regular season teams. The product that the NFL offered as its Pro Bowl this year was perhaps more exciting than the tradional format of previous years, but that may not be saying much.
