So in case you weren’t aware, the Pro Bowl skills competition is back (Rejoice!) and it’s on tonight! It includes DODGEBALL. Professional football players playing DODGEBALL. NFL DODGEBALL. TONIGHT. DODGEBALL. The AFC team will be led by Jerome Bettis and Ray Lewis, the NFC Charles Woodson and Tony Gonzales (Go NFC, amirite?)

The Pro Bowl itself will still be a hilarious joke but at least they gave us something fun to watch on the side again. It’s depressing that after what feels like a half decade of trying different things to make the Pro Bowl less of a joke (Moving the venue, changing the way the teams work, uniforms, etc) the best thing that ended up happening was basically just going back to the 2006 version and adding dodgeball because why not? It’s the first time I’ve been pumped about the Pro Bowl for years, and it’s not even about the Pro Bowl (Still gonna do my annual Pro Bowl hiking skip).

Dodgeball with NFL players is such a good idea I can’t believe it hasn’t happened yet. I think they are using nerf like footballs for the dodgeballs, which is AMAZING. If you aren’t pumped to see a bunch of hyper athletes grab dodgeballs and immediately pelt the crap out of the fat lineman I don’t think you actually like sports. I can’t wait for the first pro bowl wide receiver to stone hands a throw and get sent out of the game (It’ll be OBJ). The game is going to come down to two incredibly shifty cornerbacks throwing darts and it’ll own. I want to see Ray Lewis get pelted in the face so that he actually has a reason to cry. I want to see Jerome Bettis get targeted immediately by half the other team and have balls bouncing off his fat as he waddles to the sideline. Tell me it won’t be incredible. You can’t, because you know it will be.

They have a few other competitions like the passing challenge and catching challenge, as well as something involving drones dropping balls to catch, so that’ll be stupid but hey, it’ll probably be so dumb that it gets cancelled next year so the drone thing might be worth watching just to see how bad it is.

I speculated about it in a podcast last month or so but I hope the Pro Bowl itself just gets eliminated and replaced entirely with stupid skills crap like dodgeball. How great would it be to see a 3 legged race between tall lanky dudes and short stout runningbacks (Julio Jones and Sproles together, imagine it) or a wheelbarrow race with cornerbacks teamed up with defensive tackles. Just a giant field day for football players. Beach volleyball for the ladies. Bean bag toss (Cornhole for you southerners). Have non-kickers try and kick the longest field goal and non-QBs try to throw the longest passes. What if they had to do that spoon race thing where you put an egg on a spoon, hold it in your mouth, and race without letting it fall? But instead of a race it’s cone drills? What about WALLBALL? Did anyone else play Wallball in gymclass? Wallball was basically dodgeball but you threw the ball at a wall and someone had to catch it or dodge it, if it hit you then you had to stand against the wall as other people pelted you with the ball. Good lord what I would give to see someone like Andy Dalton have to face the wall and get pelted.

Maybe I’m a bully.

Watch the Pro Bowl skills competition tonight, just so it goes well enough ratings wise that they decide to keep it. In fact, watch the skills stuff, and skip the pro bowl, to really show the NFL what we want to see.