Posted: February 9,2006 06:10 PM

Organization brings vets to Pro Bowl

When the Pro Bowlers take the field this Sunday, there will be a lot of impact players on hand. An impact player is one who makes a difference. But there is a different group of impact players who will be watching from the sideline.

Another Pro Bowl function -- fans taking pictures with a group of cheerleaders. But these fans are different. They are wounded/disabled vets from the Iraq war. For the past two years, Dick Lynch's organization, Impact Player Partners, has been bringing vets like these to various sporting events.

"And we took the term 'impact player' from the sports field and moved it into the sports and military field. And it's to honor our wounded heroes and connect them with heroes from the sports world," says Dick Lynch, Impact Player Partners.

Chicago native Eddie Wright served with the Marines' First Recon Battalion.

"We were in the Al Anbar province of Iraq, in the Fallujah area, and I was -- we got ambushed, I was struck with a rocket propelled grenade while returning fire and took both my hands off," says Eddie Wright, 

The picture taking continued. ESPN's Chris Berman dropped by to say hello to the Marines and soldiers. Jim McMahon quarterbacked the 1985 Super Bowl champ Chicago Bears. He's been helping out with this organization since it started. It wasn't hard to convince him.

"Not at all, I mean I understand what these guys have gone through. Not only them, but the generations before them. Without them, we couldn't have the freedoms that we have today," says Jim McMahon.

Between now and Sunday, these vets will meet a lot of their favorite players. In the meantime, they joked with Miss Hawaii, Malika Dudley, took pictures for the folks back home and enjoyed the hospitality of the Hilton. Eddie Wright spoke for his fellow veterans when he said they all felt a bit overwhelmed.

"They just feel like they were doing their job, so we can't help but feel a little undeserving of all this attention, but it's appreciated," says Wright.