Thought it was a goner. Maybe you did, too.
We couldn’t even be sure there would be another Pro Bowl at all, anywhere, after last season’s farce of a game. The commissioner had seen enough, and he let it be known. But he realizes it’s a moneymaker, and a week in paradise is a bone to throw the league’s best players.
Even though it’s not really a football game, it still comes close to selling out and probably will again this year no matter how many people complain about the quality.
It’s like movie theater popcorn. Even as you’re buying it, you probably remember how bad and overpriced it is; if not, you realize about halfway through the bag. But everyone keeps coming back for it the next time.
And the Pro Bowl gets the best TV ratings of all the all-star games.
The Hawaii Tourism Authority went up against the reasonable assumption that New Orleans would get the event, since it is hosting the Super Bowl and is a tourism destination. That combination got Miami the gig in 2010.
Perhaps the fact that Honolulu is not the home city of an NFL team that had a bounty system helped. Since New Orleans couldn’t say the same, the Crescent City’s bid became a Big Not-So-Easy.
HTA head Mike McCartney, lead negotiator David Uchiyama and the rest of that oft-maligned agency never gave up. With every puffed-up report of the Pro Bowl’s demise, they told us nothing had changed, that they were still plugging away in talks with the NFL.
Hawaii’s bid succeeded even though Gov. Neil Abercrombie publicly dissed the Pro Bowl last year. The HTA guys say that in a roundabout way it might have actually helped, representing a call to action for the many who really wanted to keep it here.
NEGOTIATIONS CONTINUE for a deal of five Pro Bowls in Hawaii in the following seven years. With the tenuous nature of the event’s future in mind, the HTA is proposing other ideas to advance its long-term relationship with the NFL.
A developmental league, like the one that used to exist in Europe? A financial sinkhole the first time around, but maybe Hawaii can learn from the mistakes. Then again, maybe the mistake is doing it at all. But it’s a good idea worth looking at closely.
There’s plenty of year-round interest in football in the islands. The rosters of NFL developmental teams would be dotted with great college players with name recognition, as well as local stars who are borderline pros. Something to fill the summer months.
While we’re at it, Hawaii should swipe the Senior Bowl’s role and resurrect the Hula Bowl with it. Let’s see, where would you rather be in late January, Waikiki or Mobile, Ala.? A link up between the Hula and Pro Bowls was tried about 10 years ago, but was doomed with one game on Maui and the other on Oahu.
"The NFL said don’t limit yourself" in brainstorming, Uchiyama said, and preseason games here during years Hawaii does not host the Pro Bowl have been proposed, too.
There is at least one major limiting factor, however. The state needs a modern stadium as fast as it can construct one.
That was a fine effort to secure the next Pro Bowl. Now, does Hawaii have the political will to build a new facility that will help advance its relationship with the world’s greatest sports league to the next level?
