Khalil Mack Outside Top 10 in Pro Bowl Fan Voting
By Chase Ruttig
Often the Raider Nation take great pride in being amongst the best fans in football, but when it comes to the voting process for the 2015 Pro Bowl, it appears that the fans of the Oakland Raiders are letting down their beloved rookie linebacker in Khalil Mack who despite a strong rookie season has been given little love in the fan voting for the event. As of this week it appears that Mack’s strong rookie season will see him well outside of the Pro Bowl discussion as his strong play hasn’t translated into popularity with the casual fan.
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According to the Pro Bowl voting rankings, Mack is outside of the Top 10, which makes his bid to be the Raiders first Pro Bowler not named Marcel Reece (who has been given a spot at fullback in recent years) in the past few years unlikely. In fact Mack is behind some players that he can easily be considered as better than this season as Raider fans have shown apathy to a game that simply just does not garner enough interest for fans to truly care enough to vote.
The Top 10 for outside linebackers is as follows, a list that Mack quite easily should crack if he had the support of the Raider Nation at the polls.
"1. Von Miller2. Paul Kruger3. Clay Matthews4. Justin Houston5. Elvis Dumervil6. Julius Peppers7. Connor Barwin8. Lavonte David9. DeAndre Levy10. Brandon Marshall"
It is hard to expect fans to care about voting in players on their favorite teams to the Pro Bowl as the event doesn’t have the same prestige as the MLB All-Star Game or the NBA All-Star Game, but the opportunity to see Mack get recognition for being one of the better linebackers in the league will likely be passed up. That is unfortunate because Mack has played so well this season, but the reality is that fans just don’t care enough about the game to make a serious campaign to get a fan favorite on their teams into the Pro Bowl, even if Raiders fans think highly of their 2014 first round draft pick and his play this season.