Orlando’s Camping World Stadium was the venue for the 2025 NFL Pro Bowl, which was played on February 2nd. In both skill games and flag football, the NFC team emerged victorious. The question though is, despite a record-breaking 76-63 Pro Bowl score, was anyone truly excited about the game? Well, former NFL executive Andrew Brandt was certainly not.

In a post shared on X, Brandt echoed the sentiments of many NFL fans when he wrote, “Wait, the NFL Pro Bowl was yesterday?” The Pro Bowl is essentially intended to be the All-Star game for the NFL. However, while fans are always excited about, other All-Star Games (NBA, NHL, etc) the NFL Pro game, does not attract similar attention. Fans have frequently criticized Roger Goodell and co and called out various aspects of the game, and the viewership it received clearly highlights a problem.

The Pro Bowl did have a huge popularity, but it has been falling ever since the change in rules in 2021. One of the main reasons behind the dropping popularity of the event is the unavailability of top players. Given that the Bowl happens just a week before the Super Bowl, it is understood that the players competing in the Super Bowl will not participate. Unsurprisingly, those players are amongst the best in the league and fans would have loved to see them compete, but due to the weird timing of the Pro game, that doesn’t happen.

Even other players have dropped out of the Pro Bowl, due to it losing its credibility in the past years. Just this year, 23, yes 23!, players dropped out of the NFL Pro Bowl. If that number doesn’t shed a harsher light on the problem, it is difficult to see what will. Players like Josh Allen and Lamar Jackson opted out of this year’s Pro Bowl, and no one can blame them. According to ESPN, the Pro Bowl skill show this year averaged around 1.13 million viewers, and while this was the second-most watched in the last 6 years, it was still not what one expects from arguably the second most important game of the season.

This bring forth another question: Will viewers be interested in the game anytime soon? Because the way things are going so far, it doesn’t seem likely.

Will the Pro Bowl ever gain back its credibility?

There was a time when everyone eagerly waited for the Pro Bowl. And why not? It was an opportunity for everyone to see the league’s best stars face off against each other. However, poor games and falling viewership led to changes in the game format. A bunch of skill tasks and a flag football game are now played and the team with the most points wins the game. Well, this hasn’t worked well as even now fans are not even excited for the game.

So, what can be done? Well, there is a simple solution.

Change the timing of the game. Almost every other big league has their All-Star game mid-season. And that works. If one takes into consideration the current scenario, 11 players from the Chiefs and Eagles were selected for the Pro Bowl. And it was a given that they won’t be competing in the Pro Bowl as they need to compete in the Super Bowl a week later. But what would happen, if the game happens earlier, let’s say somewhere in October or Early November? Almost 50/60% of those players might compete in the game.

There will be players who will still opt out, but the number is bound to be lower. And with truly the league’s best competing in the Pro Bowl, wouldn’t fans want to see it? And with the current format of the game, the possibility of an injury is much less, giving more incentive to the players to join the game. Well, what do you think?