Back in the days when the Pro Bowl followed the Super Bowl, ESPN liked to bill it as “One Last Final Last Game” of the NFL season.
Now, it no longer follows the Super Bowl. NBC airs it and, sadly, unless there is a new contract forthcoming, Sunday’s event could, indeed, be “one last final last game” for it at Aloha Stadium.
After 32 years of memories, that would be too bad on several fronts. Not the least of which being the quirky episodes that have surrounded the annual all-star contest.
As a reminder, we offer 10 memorable Pro Bowl moments:
1. In 2002, Raiders quarterback Rich Gannon was named the game’s outstanding player. One problem: Someone left the trophy back at the hotel.
A quick check of the Aloha Stadium executive offices turned up somebody’s bowling trophy and that was hurriedly cleaned up and presented to Gannon.
Quipped sportscaster Dan Fouts, who was doing the game for TV: “They were never like that when I won the MVP.”
2. When NFC head coach George Seifert looked down the sidelines in the second half of the 1993 game to reinsert Troy Aikman in the action, he was unable to find the QB.
Seifert asked the players, “Where’s Troy?” and was reportedly told, “probably at 30,000 feet.”
Aikman had hopped a ride to the airport and was on his way home.
3. When the Dallas Cowboys lost to San Francisco in the playoffs in 1995, it was hard to tell which bothered their coach, Barry Switzer, most — the loss or that it meant he’d be coaching the NFC team in the Pro Bowl.
“Damn,” Switzer said. “I didn’t want to go to Honolulu. Already been there 16 times.”
4. But Switzer wasn’t one to let the game interfere with his dining. He had a family member go to the concession stand and bring him two hot dogs to munch on during the contest.
5. In the second Pro Bowl held in Hawaii (1981), Tampa Bay coach John McKay put the game in perspective for new players at practice one day. Said McKay: “Men, our goal this week is to be on the beach at 11:30, and I’m just here to play golf, so get to know your assistant coaches.”
6. Chicago Bears safety Mark Carrier wasn’t into long practices, either. “Let’s hurry this up. I’ve got a facial scheduled for 1:30,” Carrier was quoted as saying one year.
7. Then-Jacksonville coach Tom Coughlin was asked to describe the intensity of his team’s practice sessions by an eager questioner. “Intensity?” Coughlin fumed. “This is an all-star game.”
8. Some players, however, never got the hang-loose memo. In 1998, Oakland’s Kevin Gogan became the first player to be kicked out of the game for fighting.
9. And games can sometimes be tough on quarterbacks, especially late in a close contest, when the difference between the winners and losers shares can be $20,000. Boomer Esiason used to say it was “like being a goalie in an NHL All-Star Game. Everybody’s shooting at you. Everyone’s trying to kill you.”
10. At season’s end in 1990 then-San Diego running back Marion Butts, no fan of long air flights or, apparently, much of a scholar of history, said he’d prefer to play the game on the mainland.
“The United States is OK by me,” he said.
Reach Ferd Lewis at flewis@staradvertiser.com or 529-4820.
