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Do NFL players actually learn anything valuable at the Pro Bowl? Yes, according to one Hall of Famer

LAS VEGAS — The actual games during the Pro Bowl week don’t have a whole lot of value, but that doesn’t mean that the time the players spend with each other isn’t valuable for them on a personal and professional level.

Even in this new, diminished form, the NFL is still sending the best they have to offer to the Pro Bowl Games, creating a unique opportunity for players to learn from each other. It’s a week of celebration, honors, and brotherhood, and it can be a useful time for NFL players to learn from their talented peers and hone their skills for the upcoming season.

Pro Football Hall of Famer Ray Lewis, who made 13 Pro Bowls and coached the AFC team alongside Peyton Manning on Sunday, spoke life to the value of the game as a player.

“The thing I learned the most was about how much the greats study,” Lewis said. “When I first played with Junior Seau, to be able to listen to him and how he studied and then he showed me his locker and how many papers, how many formations and stuff he had written in his locker. I was like ‘WHAT?!’ And then we were at the Pro Bowl and he was doing the same thing!”

Almost everyone who makes the Pro Bowl is an accomplished NFL player, in some form. Physically, these guys are all comparable to each other. The edge that separates them from each other is the mental side of the game, the preparation side of the game.

According to Lewis, learning how to be a more productive and efficient player is something that he learned during his early years as a Pro Bowler.

Now 47 and enjoying his post-football life, Lewis sees himself as someone who can help the new generation of players become better at their craft. That’s because he was in their shoes at one point, trying to pick up knowledge from the veterans that he grew up playing with in the NFL.

“You can make as much money as you want to make, but these moments will never be here again,” Lewis said. “You must take every one of these moments as a learning experience. You can learn something every single time you step out there. I get it, the game is different than when I played, but with that understanding: What can you get better at?”

Ray Lewis, a 13-time Pro Bowler himself, said the event is a valuable time for players to study their peers and fashion edges they can use during the next season and beyond.  (Kirby Lee-USA TODAY Sports)

Ray Lewis, a 13-time Pro Bowler himself, said the event is a valuable time for players to study their peers and fashion edges they can use during the next season and beyond. (Kirby Lee-USA TODAY Sports)

Even in a flag football game, there are skills to take away from the field and apply them to actual tackle football that will resume in a few months.

“I was talking to Sauce [Gardner] right,” Lewis said. “Snatching a flag helps you break down in the open field and keep your hips up under you. Look at what you hit, it’s all the little things. That’s kind of what my speech was about, the moment. Me and Peyton have done this for so long, man. It’s moments and I want guys to understand how important they really are, because they go fast.”

Football is a mental game as much as it is a physical one. Everyone in the Pro Bowl has the physical talent to be a great football player, but the edges where they’ll get even better lie in their preparations.

“I took that and made my whole life around it,” Lewis said about the lessons he learned from Seau. “Same thing I learned from Peyton. When Ashley first ran up to me, which is Peyton’s wife, she said, ‘This man made a room about you! He studied and everything.’ I went and made me a movie room! There was always something to learn.

That’s the real value of the Pro Bowl. Flag football is fun, bragging rights are better, but being able to learn from peers and legends of the game is invaluable.