2021 NFL Pro Bowl Rosters: Snubs, Highlights and Observations

The 2021 Pro Bowl will not take place this year, though it always made sense to announce the team anyway given the various financial commitments and contract incentives that are tied to the league’s yearly All-Star festivities. This game carries a massive weight regardless of how cynical we’ve all become in regard to the actual quality of play. Perhaps one day we’ll be able to streamline the voting process, so it becomes less a popularity and recognition contest and more about which players are dominating on the field and carrying their respective teams.

I covered a handful of Pro Bowls when I worked for the NFL and I was always struck by how significant it was from a player perspective. When you are on location surrounded by your peers and their families, there is something regal about the whole thing. An acknowledgement that you have arrived. A time to let off steam while plotting the next phase of a meteoric career.

Alas, those things will have to be done virtually this year, like everything else. I can promise you this: I will never take a Pro Bowl for granted again. I’m sure any player who has made a handful of them could probably say the same thing. If 2020 has taught us anything, it’s that life in the football universe was pretty darn good.

Below are some thoughts, snubs and musings on the 2021 rosters. Since the roster won’t be fluid like it has been in years past, there isn’t much of an opportunity for the voters to bail themselves out by retroactively lifting a batch of deserved players to spots taken up by injured starters or guys who are in the Super Bowl.

Ryan Tannehill (left), Justin Jefferson (center) and Trey Hendrickson (right) have all had Pro Bowl seasons, but didn’t all make the cut.

Christopher Hanewinckel/USA TODAY Sports (Tannehill); Brad Rempel/USA TODAY Sports (Jefferson); Derick E. Hingle/USA TODAY Sports (Hendrickson)

• My first observation: No love for Ryan Tannehill. I think we might still be adjusting to the idea that the former Dolphins first-round pick is not just a fun comeback story. He’s a legitimate, elite quarterback who is among the top players in the league in some of the best all-encompassing metrics in the sport. Tannehill is fourth in total QBR and third in defense-adjusted Yards Above Replacement. Even if you don’t care about those things, he’s fifth in touchdown passes with just five interceptions. This is another remarkably efficient season from Tannehill and while the AFC quarterback troika is a difficult one to crack (they went with Patrick Mahomes, Josh Allen and Deshaun Watson), one could easily make an argument for his inclusion (perhaps over the quarterback also also plays in the division Tannehill’s team is leading).

• Also in the snub category: While I’m more than happy to take the credit for being right and calling for Evan Engram to make his first Pro Bowl this season (along with several others) it does feel odd that a tight end with one receiving touchdown and a 56.8% catch rate got in over a field that, yes, is underwhelming statistically with some of the heavy hitters out with injury, but still talented. My friend over at NFL.com, Nick Shook, nominated Robert Tonyan from Green Bay, who has 10 touchdown receptions on the season. Irv Smith from the Vikings, Dallas Goedert from the Eagles and even George Kittle on a limited body of work deserve some recognition there.

• James Robinson, the standout undrafted free-agent rookie in Jacksonville, is also one of those players who—in a normal year— you can imagine would jump onto a roster the second somebody else would opt for some postseason medical work or injury rehabilitation instead of playing in the game. Robinson is third in the NFL in rushing, ahead of both Nick Chubb and Josh Jacobs, who both reached the game instead. His first-down rushing percentage is also higher than that of Derek Henry or Chubb (we’re not saying Henry didn’t deserve to make it, calm down).

• Jets safety Marcus Maye and Bengals safety Jessie Bates were also in a tough spot and a loaded class. Tyrann Mathieu was never not going to get in when the Chiefs’ defense is playing this well. So much of that system works because of his multiplicity. That said, Maye, as we saw on Sunday against the Rams, is putting on some clinical work amid a beleaguered defensive backfield. This is his third straight year allowing an opposing QB completion percentage below 60%. This season he’s also logged a career best 70 opposing passer rating on plays in which he’s targeted, which is great. Bates, meanwhile, has a 55 opposing passer rating and 55.3% opposing QB completion percentage.

• Falcons receiver Calvin Ridley is sixth in the NFL in touchdowns, sixth in yards and seventh in Football Outsiders’ Effective Yards metric. All of this with basically the league average in separation per route run. This offense did Ridley no favors and he only had Julio Jones getting coverages rolled his way for roughly half the season.

• The Saints’ Trey Hendrickson is second in the league with 12.5 sacks, behind only Yannick Ngakoue (and tied with Aaron Donald!). So is teammate Cam Jordan reaching the Pro Bowl instead of him just recognition of who is helping create those opportunities? (Jordan has 6.5 sacks.) Or is it simply a massive oversight on the part of the voters? Hendrickson has more pressures and as many QB knockdowns and hurries as Jordan does.

• It’s hard not to feel for Garrett Bolles in Denver, who might have been one of the biggest snubs of the bunch. Say what you will about grading services, but Pro Football Focus has Bolles as their No. 3 tackle of the year, ahead of some pretty lofty company like Andrew Whitworth, Duane Brown and more. He has not given up a sack in 2020, which is the best ratio of pass snaps to sacks allowed in the NFL. More than that, the NFL world at large was ready to run the former first-round pick out of Denver. This would have been a nice—and warranted—acknowledgement of how far he’s come.

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• Good for Dave Gettleman and James Bradberry. It’s important to admit when you’re wrong and with Gettleman, a lot of us lampooned his offseason when, in reality, it ended up targeted and fairly dead-on. James Bradberry has been one of the best cornerbacks in football this year. It’s interesting to see his total number of targets drop per season as the rest of the NFL catches on to the fact that he’s not the person you want to be throwing the ball to. Still, over 80 targets Bradberry has allowed a formidable 60% completion rate and an opposing QB rating of 77.2. You might be able to also make the case for Logan Ryan, Leonard Williams and Dexter Lawrence as potential alternates in a normal year.

• Justin Jefferson making a Pro Bowl in his debut season takes the sting out of the Stefon Diggs nomination a little bit for Vikings fans (and the front office). I think Rick Spielman can rest easy knowing that he did the right thing for the franchise by using the first-rounder they netted from the Bills trade to draft a one-for-one replacement who only trails Diggs by a few receiving yards, is edging him by two touchdowns, has a higher first-down percentage and three more explosive plays. Diggs, though, has a slightly better (and career-high to this point) catch percentage.

• I still think Orlando Brown, Jr. is a great story. Brown, you’ll remember, was crushed for his less-than-ideal combine performance in 2018, slipped to the third round and now has made two straight Pro Bowls in 2019 and 2020. Ozzie Newsome, it seems, has never left this front five without a long-term anchor, and even though you could make an argument for Ronnie Stanley to be in this game too had he not been injured, Brown is a nice nod to the idea that you don’t have to be defined by a meaningless televised agility competition.

• Vic Fangio sent a pair of Pro Bowlers this year in Justin Simmons and Bradley Chubb. It’s interesting to follow Fangio’s path as a defensive coordinator and see how All-Stars seem to sprout like weeds. If this team can get some semblance of momentum going on offense, this would seem to be a check mark in the column to keep Fangio another year and watch this defense grow into something special.