Deion Sanders, who I find suuuuper annoying, said something on Dan Patrick’s show with which I actually agreed. He thinks the Hall of Fame is letting in too many people, thus watering down the honor. When you consider that the Hall had instituted a minimum number of people to induct each year, that certainly explains why players like Kurt Warner, Jerome Bettis and Shannon Sharpe are there. It also explains why we’re already talking about the inevitable induction of Eli “Daddy Help Me” Manning.
Now, with the noted exception of Manning, we can certainly agree that players in the Hall like Warner and Co. were certainly very good or even great players. But, were they transformative players to the game? No, my friends, they were not. They’ve got a few records here and there (many of which have since been surpassed) and they went to some Pro Bowls and even got an MVP or two. But, will they be one of the first names–hell, the first ten names–that come to mind when someone asks you who were the greatest players in the game? No, my friends, they will not. They do not spring to mind the way players like Jim Brown, Bart Starr or Jerry Rice do. Nobody is going to question their place in the Hall because they were pivotal to the game when they played in a way that many of our more current inductees were not.
Hell, we haven’t even talked about the people inducted for their coaching careers. Coaches like Tony Dungy and Bill Cowher who–again–were very good coaches and who each have tasted Super Bowl victory as head coaches are not the caliber of coaches like George Hallas, Paul Brown or, you know, the guy they named the Lombardi Trophy for. Those guys absolutely dominated the coaching world in ways that Cowher and Dungy didn’t.
I’m not even going to talk about the owners. That’s just one giant circle jerk.
So, yeah, Deion has an excellent point to make as much as I hate to admit it. While I’m certain there are at least a few people who might question Sanders’ place in the Hall, I do not. He’s there not just for his performance as a cornerback (despite his aversion to tackling), he’s also there for his outstanding performance as a kick and punt returner. The guy was seemingly everywhere all at the same time. I hated every moment of his time on the field, but that’s mostly because he didn’t play for my team. Which, come to think of it, might be another of those criteria when considering who belongs in the Hall.
Kurt Warner gets in because of the story. I do think Warner is probably one of the best quarterbacks in NFL history, and I think if one of the criteria is “can the story of the NFL be told without mentioning this player”, it’s kinda hard to ignore the guy who went from baggin’ groceries at the Hyvee to Super Bowl MVP to dud in New York to holy shit he’s still awesome in Arizona.
Shannon Sharpe was arguably the first “receiving” tight end, in that Mike Shanahan straight admitted that he couldn’t block in line but still find ways to move him around the offense to create matches, at a time in the 90s where tight ends were still mostly considered to be last-resort receiving threats.
I mean…Hall of Fames in general are inherently ridiculous, and the NFL’s is no different than anyone else’s in that regard. If you let less people in, then you have to spend, like, 10 fuckin’ years hearing about how Kurt Warner and Eli Manning aren’t in there but is.
Totally agree with your take on Warner. Beat me to the submit button I see now too. Fie my aged digits!
Well said. I was trying to make this point on the #handegg page when Eli announced he was done (for now). Looking at the classes this millennia they vote in 6+ a year on average and 7+ in the last decade, with 8 in 4 of the last 5 classes.
https://www.profootballhof.com/heroes-of-the-game/years/#2000s
I use this criteria when I say a player is an HoFer. Not if I think they are worthy but do I think they’ll be voted in.
Baseball is good at limiting classes but their vote is a joke (Thank you, Dan!!)
Hockey and Basketball do the best job of including the entirety of their sports and electing international players and both men and women.
Football calls itself the Pro Football Hall of Fame but good luck finding a CFL player in there or any “Contributor” that made the game popular in Japan. Italy and Austrailia are other countries I know used to be huge into handegg and always in the world cup.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_football_in_Japan
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IFAF_World_Championship
Yeah, there were a few years, several decades ago, when the HOF class was only 3 people. I think that’s really more how it should look. Not everyone who plays for 15 years should get into the Hall just because they played that long. Looking at you, Jason Witten.
On the other hand, if they just shove Jason Witten in there on the first ballot, then you don’t have to listen to Screamin’ A and The-Guy-Who’s-Not-Skip talking forever about why Jason Witten should or shouldn’t be in the Hall of Fame.
That’s my whole thing; put people in the Hall so I don’t have to listen to the media narrative about it for fuckin’ years.
I say let ’em bitch. I drink their tears with my morning coffee.
Hard to disagree. I can however accept Warner being a HoFer. His career and origin story–from grocery clerk in an Iowa college town to quarterbacking one the most potent offenses I’ve ever seen– were inspirational if not transformational, replete with the “blue collar” work ethic the NFL fetishizes to absurdity these days. (I just read something somewhere on this very topic but my brain refuses to remember as I write this.)
I think Warner is in there because of the story, too. But, if that’s going to be a factor in determining who gets in, then Donald Driver–who spent time as a homeless kid in Houston and committing petty crimes before winning a Super Bowl and becoming the all time receiving leader for the Packers after 14 seasons–should also be considered for the Hall. He racked up over 10,000 yards on almost 750 receptions and 61 TDs. That’s comparable to Sharpe’s numbers. But, he’s not a household name. Driver was a great player, reminiscent of Lynn Swann’s style of receiving, but he still shouldn’t be in the Hall (and isn’t) for the same reasons Sharpe and Warner shouldn’t.
There were a ton of red flags to Warner’s story for me so I’ve never been a fan of him off the field but I do think there is enough to get him in the Hall based on the era he played. The game and rules change so often I try not to use historical factors or comparisons. I can’t think of a more subjective exercise than picking who belongs but it helps drive interest and just damn fun to debate. One part of me says they all belong and the other says none do.
When this came up in #handegg I started looking at Pro Football Reference and found myself in this rabbit hole.
https://www.pro-football-reference.com/hof/hofm_QB.htm
“The Pro Football Reference Hall of Fame Monitor (HOFm) is a metric designed to estimate a player’s chances of making the Pro Football Hall of Fame using AV, Pro Bowls, All-Pros, championships, and various stat milestones. The players listed below are the top 250 HOFm-rated players who played QB starting in 1955 or later for at least 50 career games. A score of 100 is around the average modern-era inductee.”
https://www.sports-reference.com/blog/2019/12/introducing-the-pfr-hof-monitor/
“The base formula uses weighted Approximate Value (which is 100% of the player’s peak year, 95% of their second-best year, 90% of their third-best, and so on) as a starting point. Bonuses are added for Pro Football Hall of Fame All-Decade selections, MVP awards, Defensive Player of the Year awards, first-team AP All-Pro selections, championships and Pro Bowls, in descending weights. In addition, bonuses are added if a player has earned first-team All-Pro in over 33% of their seasons, which helps out short but excellent careers like Gale Sayers and Terrell Davis. For players not yet inducted, small bonuses are also added for semifinalist and finalist appearances on previous HOF ballots, since that indicates that they’ve already been seriously considered.”
This would probably hold more water if their metrics didn’t rank Eli Manning (who can be found in the dictionary under Average) as having a much higher chance of getting in the Hall than Jim Plunkett who also won 2 SBs.
This goes with my thing about not comparing eras. PFR is using Pro bowls which are much easier to make today and then giving weighted points to stats over a certain threshold when stats for QBs are so much easier to come by in the modern game. All-pro is a good catagory since only 1 would make it each year.
And for the record; Bobby Hebert’s USFL numbers should be included. Kelly’s & Young’s too.
Was it Paul Lukas’s excellent essay on stolen valor in New Republic?
https://newrepublic.com/amp/article/156304/sports-teams-blue-collar-rhetoric-football-basketball-working-class-values
I’m honestly just surprised they have put Pat Tillman in with the NFL’s troop fetish. Every Fox News host and viewer would splooge all over themselves.
Not too many people know how he died and fewer know what happened at his memorial.
I’m in the minority, but I’m on the opposite side. I say screw it, let Warner and Eli Manning it, let Frank Howard and Bobby Grich in the baseball Hall of Fame, and let history worry about who really meets the test of time.
Life is short, and I don’t see the point of quibbling whether some 60 year old guy should have had a career batting average seven points higher in 1989 to get in, or whether some left tackle should be left out because he only made the Pro Bowl two times.
Nobody in their right mind thinks Jeter was as good as Ripken, but it doesn’t somehow diminish Ripken to have Jeter there too. Sikma wasn’t nearly as good as Jabbar or Malone, but I’m fine with Sikma being a HoFer too. It’s a bronze plaque and an opportunity for some retiree to make few more bucks signing autographs. I say let ’em in.
But I agree about the owners. Bud Selig and all the rest should get in line behind Barry Bonds, and then still not be allowed in, even if they buy a ticket.
And other than cruelty, what point does it serve to stall inducting someone until after they’ve passed away? I’ll direct people to the HOF speech given by Ron Santo’s widow, chiding the committee for waiting so long that her husband (who battled diabetes throughout his career) didn’t get to experience the honor.
Another thing is that the longer history goes on, the worse and worse the Hall of Famers of yesteryear look compared to even the average players today:
https://sports.theonion.com/in-my-day-ballplayers-were-for-shit-1819583715
“I’ll never forget my first big-league ballgame. It was 1931, at the old Polo Grounds in New York. Giants versus the Reds. Dad by my side and Crackerjacks in hand, I took my seat in the grandstand on a glorious Saturday afternoon. That’s when I first laid eyes on him. Out there patrolling the grass in center field for the home-team Giants was Ducky “Lead Legs” Cronin. Worst ballplayer you ever saw. Christ, did he suck.”
Don Coryell isn’t in yet, so they haven’t let enough coaches in.
They should put John McKay in there solely on the strength of his press conference performances.
Nice. And Lee Elia for Best Single.
“I’m in favor of it”
No great quotes here but a fun little 8 minutes. I cired when they lost to the Rams that year.