Remembering Derrick Johnson’s hit on Jamaal Charles in the Pro Bowl

So we decided to tune into the 2022 Pro Bowl because of a lack of anything else to do and the fact that it’s the last time we’re going to see the stars of the Kansas City Chiefs suiting up for anything in the next six months. Unfortunately, the NFL’s all-star exhibition looks more like the laziest game of disinterested dads in someone’s backyard.

We’re not exactly sure what we want in terms of intensity but we know this effortless exercise is not working at all. And it’s actually brought to mind some recent days in which the Pro Bowl was a bit more physical.

For one instance, there was a moment on January 26, 2014 when Chiefs fans were made to feel a bit awkward while watching the Pro Bowl following the 2013 NFL season. That’s because their players were on opposing sides and forced to play against each other. That was not good in the case of running back Jamaal Charles because he was taken down by linebacker Derrick Johnson on a particularly jarring hit.

Check out the replay here in case you’ve forgotten:

In this particular Pro Bowl, the NFL had players drafted by a couple of team captains like Deion Sanders and Jerry Rice. This led to Charles going up against Johnson and the results were tilted in DJ’s favor on this play. From there, it was hard to know how to feel as Chiefs fans because the hit was great but it was also against Charles in a meaningless game.

Hence the reason that we’re here at this year’s version of the Pro Bowl. We can complain about the lackadaisical nature of the game, but the truth is that any Chiefs fan would be going crazy if, say, Patrick Mahomes were to become injured on a quarterback sack or Travis Kelce came up limping after a full-on tackle. As fans, we cannot have our cake and eat it, too.

So for now, we guess the Pro Bowl has to be a touch football contest instead of any real physical battle. At least the players are safer that way even if it is more boring.