The Pro Bowl has rapidly fallen out of favor to measure greatness. Perhaps this was always the case to some degree, as All-Pro nominations always carry more weight when assessing a player’s Hall of Fame résumé. At the same time, I think a first-time Pro Bowler is significant because it marks the year of a player’s arrival not just in the eyes of analysts who pore over the game, but in the general public and the players’ cohorts, meaning that the player has become so good that he has risen to unignorable.
As is tradition, my list of potential first-time Pro Bowlers cannot include rookies, and we’ll also try not to just load up the list with second-year players who were barely edged out of the now-defunct all-star game. Last year’s list was scattered with a few misses but featured hits like Christian Gonzalez, Cooper DeJean and, in my opinion, adequately reflected the looming breakout of Caleb Williams despite Williams somehow not making the Pro Bowl, even after an incredible season (in fairness to Williams, the NFC field was far more crowded than the AFC contingent that welcomed Shedeur Sanders into its ranks).
