Dre Greenlaw, 3 other 49ers who were massive Pro Bowl snubs
By Peter Panacy
The 49ers are sending six players to the Pro Bowl this season, but Dre Greenlaw isn’t one of them. Instead, he joins the list of significant Niners snubs.
Only a handful of teams this year were good enough to send at least five players to the annual Pro Bowl, which won’t be quite like previous Pro Bowls in that the 2023 installment will be more about flag football than a watered-down blue-versus-red awkwardness we all tried to avoid.
At any rate, the San Francisco 49ers were one of those few teams, ultimately sending six players to the Pro Bowl, which will be held leading up to that flag football game on Sunday, Feb. 5 a week before the Super Bowl.
The Niners have the following players named to the 2023 Pro Bowl:
- FB Kyle Juszczyk
- OT Trent Williams
- TE George Kittle
- DE Nick Bosa
- LB Fred Warner
- S Talanoa Hufanga
For Juszczyk and Williams, the Pro Bowl is essentially automatic. Meanwhile, Kittle, Bosa and Warner are no strangers to the NFL all-star game either.
Hufanga was a bit of a revelation, but he’s played more than well enough to justify the selection.
There were, however, some notable snubs from the Pro Bowl, and we take a look at a few of them here.
49ers Pro Bowl snub No. 4: LB Dre Greenlaw
Granted, only two middle linebackers from the NFC could make it, and the Niners already sent one in Warner.
The other backer selected is the New Orleans Saints’ Demario Davis, and while that’s not a terrible selection at all, it’s hard not including Warner’s linemate, Dre Greenlaw, who has been playing about as well as any other middle backer in the league right now.
Warner included.
Congrats to all the Pro Bowl selections, including the six 49ers (Juszczyk, Kittle, Williams, Bosa, Warner, Hufanga) who made it. Others (C. Ward, McCaffrey, Deebo, Jimmy G, Gould) had a strong case. Dre Greenlaw not making it is ridiculous.
— Michael Silver (@MikeSilver) December 22, 2022
About the only thing separating Greenlaw from Davis is the fact the latter offers up more in the pass-rush department and has 6.5 on the year, while Greenlaw is a coverage linebacker and run-stopper.
Perhaps there’ll be some alternatives, and that could get Greenlaw in, and Davis definitely has better name recognition than Greenlaw (Pro Bowl voting matters, people).
Still, Greenlaw is enjoying a top-five linebacker kind of year in 2022, and he deserved to be recognized.