Previewing the NFL Hall of Fame Class of 2014

By Dan Trammel
@HighwaytoHall

I am pleasantly surprised by the announcement of the NFL Hall of Fame Class of 2013. I did not believe the voters would get it right. That is not to say that I do not think the voters do a terrific job, or that their job is an easy one. On the contrary, it is exceptionally difficult and I believe the voters do a terrific job. How do you select 5 Hall of Famers out of a group of 13 or 14 Hall of Famers? Regardless of who you pick, someone will be upset. But they managed to select the 5 best candidates. Fans can nitpick all they want. In the end, at least eight of the people not selected will eventually enter the Hall of Fame. But you’d be hard-pressed to find 5 better people with whom to start a football team.

In evaluating the finalists, I believed past voting trends would continue to hold true. In some cases, I was correct. Some people believed all four first-time eligible players would be inducted. As this had never happened before, there was little reason to believe it would now.  On this point I was correct. But I underestimated how highly the voters would view those four men. I thought Warren Sapp’s personality may be held against him, even though the voters are told only to consider a man’s play on the field. I also thought, as only seven linemen had been elected in their first year of eligibility since 1987, it was unlikely for more than one to do so this year. Yet, the voters selected three.

I also correctly noted it was unlikely for two contributors to make it in the same year. But I was surprised when the voters seemed to switch from Andre Reed to Cris Carter.  Reed  advanced  further in the voting than Carter  in 2010 and 2011, but it was Carter who gained induction this year. As such, I only picked 2 of the 5 modern-era candidates correctly. Much to my chagrin, my erroneous predictions were picked up by newspapers across the country. See for example the Troy Record, the San Jose Mercury News, and the York Daily Record. As my predictions for the Class of 2013 were incorrect, my preliminary predictions for the Class of 2014 are also wrong. So let’s again attempt to predict the Class of 2014.

2014 will be an excellent opportunity for the voters to remove some of the backlog of Hall of Fame worthy players. In 2013, there were 4 very strong first-time eligible candidates, 3 of whom were inducted, marking the first time since 2006 that 3 first-time eligible candidates were inducted. Next year does not feature as strong of a cast of candidates.

The top candidates joining the ballot next year are as follows:

Tony Dungy

Mike Holmgren

Jon Gruden

Marvin Harrison

Derrick Brooks

Rodney Harrison

Shaun Alexander
(Some people place former Seattle Seahawks left tackle Walter Jones in this group, but we believe he is not eligible until 2015, as he spent all of 2009 on injured reserve). [Note: It turns out we were wrong, Jones is eligible. Here is our assessment of his chances.]

As you can see, three of the candidates are coaches. Each coach has a Super Bowl title. Dungy gets bonus points for building the Tampa Bay Buccaneers from a laughingstock into a perennial playoff team. Holmgren gets bonus points for turning the Green Bay Packers around. Gruden may get bonus points for his announcing career. Regardless, none of these coaches are first-ballot Hall of Famers. Here is a list of the coaches elected in their first year of eligibility: Don Shula (1997), Chuck Noll (1993), and Tom Landry (1990). Not only have these three men not been in my kitchen, they also make up the Mount Rushmore of coaches (or at least are in the discussion).

That brings us to the four players. Let’s start with Rodney Harrison.

Safety is one of the least represented positions in the Hall of Fame. As stated in a previous post, “the career of only one Hall of Fame safety began after the NFL-AFL merger in 1970 (Ronnie Lott).” Here are the nine safeties currently enshrined in Canton:

Jack Christiansen	Mel Renfro
Ken Houston	Emlen Tunnell
Paul Krause	Larry Wilson
Yale Lary	Willie Wood
Ronnie Lott

If these are the safeties considered Hall of Famers, let’s take a look at those the voters have not yet deemed worthy:

Name	Pro Bowls	1st Team All-Pro	2nd Team All-Pro	Games/ Starts	INTs	Rings/ SB Apps	All-Decade
Rodney Harrison	2	2	1	186/159	34	2/3	No
John Lynch	9	2	2	224/191	26	1/1	No
Steve Atwater	8	2	1	167/166	24	2/3	Yes
Joey Browner	6	3	1	145/117	37	0/0	Yes
Deron Cherry	6	3	2	148/124	50	0/0	Yes
Tim McDonald	6	0	4	191/187	40	1/1	No
Dennis Smith	6	0	1	184/170	30	0/1	No
Kenny Easley	5	3	0	89/87	32	0/0	Yes
Carnell Lake	5	1	3	185/171	16	0/1	Yes
Darren Woodson	5	3	0	178/162	23	2/2	No
Leroy Butler	4	4	0	181/165	38	1/2	Yes
Nolan Cromwell	4	3	0	115/108	37	0/1	Yes
Mark Carrier	3	0	1	168/164	32	0/0	No

None of these candidates have ever been discussed by the Hall of Fame committee, meaning they have never been among the 15 finalists. Rodney Harrison won’t either. The last safety among the final 15 was Donnie Shell in 2002. Of the players on the above list, Harrison is far from the most deserving candidate.

Our next candidate is former Seattle Seahawks running back Shaun Alexander. Alexander is a candidate that will garner a significant amount of support from the statheads in about 20 years, by a new wave of statisticians who never saw him play. I doubt anyone on the current committee will vote for him. As impressive as his numbers are, he fails the “feel” or “smell” test. He simply doesn’t feel like a Hall of Famer. His advocates say to compare his numbers to Earl Campbell.

	Games	Rushes	Yards	TDs	Y/A	Rec	Yards	TDs
Campbell	115	2187	9407	74	4.3	121	806	0
Alexander	123	2187	9453	100	4.3	215	1520	12

Earl Campbell was a first-ballot Hall of Famer. Alexander is not. Campbell dominated games. He ran with a determination that few players ever have. Alexander had the reputation of being soft.

But he certainly has some nice numbers. Here is the list of players with the most career rushing touchdowns:

Name	TDs
Emmitt Smith	164
LaDainian Tomlinson	145
Marcus Allen	123
Walter Payton	110
Jim Brown	106
John Riggins	104
Marshall Faulk	100
Shaun Alexander	100
Barry Sanders	99
Jerome Bettis	91
Franco Harris	91
Eric Dickerson	90
Curtis Martin	90

But now here is the same players placed in order of career rushing yards:

Name	Rushing Yards
Emmitt Smith	18355
Walter Payton	16726
Barry Sanders	15269
Curtis Martin	14101
LaDainian Tomlinson	13684
Jerome Bettis	13662
Eric Dickerson	13259
Jim Brown	12312
Marshall Faulk	12279
Marcus Allen	12243
Franco Harris	12120
John Riggins	11352
Shaun Alexander	9453

Breaking this list down again in order of yards per carry, Alexander is 6^th with a very impressive 4.32 yards per carry. But comparing him to some of his contemporaries, he looks less impressive.

	Games	Rushes	Yards	TDs	Y/A	Rec	Yards	TDs
Ahman Green	148	2056	9205	60	4.48	378	2883	14
Shaun Alexander	123	2187	9453	100	4.32	215	1520	12
Clinton Portis	113	2230	9923	75	4.45	247	2018	5
Tiki Barber	154	2217	10449	55	4.71	586	5183	12
Corey Dillon	150	2618	11241	82	4.29	244	1913	7
Fred Taylor	153	2534	11695	66	4.62	290	2384	8

Alexander’s accolades include 3 Pro Bowls, one 1^st Team All-Pro selection, one 2^nd Team All-Pro selection, and the 2005 NFL MVP Award. The MVP Award is nice but the other accolades are rather pedestrian. Although the touchdown total is difficult to ignore, with Alexander there will probably always be sufficient a sufficient “but…” to keep him out. Regardless, he certainly does not go in this year.

Now we turn to this year’s strongest candidates.

After finishing 6-10 in 1994, the Bucs held the 7^th pick in the 1995 NFL draft. They traded the 7^th pick and a third round pick (#72) to the Philadelphia Eagles for the Eagles 1^st round pick (#12) and two 2^nd round picks (#43 and #63). The Eagles infamously selected Mike Mamula with the 7^th pick (and Greg Jefferson with the 72^nd pick) while the Bucs selected first-ballot Hall of Famer Warren Sapp. The Bucs then traded their 2^nd round pick (#41) and one of the picks received from the Eagles (#63) to the Dallas Cowboys in order to move back into the first round. The Bucs selected Derrick Brooks with the pick received from the Cowboys while Dallas chose Ronald Davis (#41) and Shane Hannah (#63) with the two 2^nd round picks obtained from Tampa.

Sapp and Brooks teamed with John Lynch (3^rd round selection in 1993) to form one of the great defenses in NFL history and help Tampa end a streak of 14 consecutive losing seasons with 6-straight seasons with a winning percentage of .500 or better, including 5 playoff appearances.

In a 14-year career, Brooks’ accolades are as follows:

11 Pro Bowls

5-time 1^st Team All-Pro

4-time 2^nd Team All-Pro

2002 NFL Defensive Player of the Year

Member of the 2000s All-Decade Team

Member of the Super Bowl XXXVII Champions

Here is a list of the defensive players named to 8 or more Pro Bowls while being selected a 1^st-Team All-Pro 5 or more times:

Merlin Olsen	Mike Singletary	Bill George
Reggie White	Lawrence Taylor	Jack Ham
Bob Lilly	Bobby Bell	Deacon Jones
Gino Marchetti	Willie Brown	Deion Sanders
Bruce Smith	Jack Lambert	Larry Wilson
Rod Woodson	Alan Page	Willie Wood
Joe Greene	Randy White	Derrick Brooks
Ronnie Lott	Chuck Bednarik	Ray Lewis
Leo Nomellini	Nick Buoniconti	Junior Seau
Joe Schmidt	Dick Butkus	Ed Reed

All 26 players eligible for the Hall of Fame have been inducted, with Brooks, Lewis, Seau, and Reed waiting their turns. Brooks won’t wait long. He walks in on the first ballot.

Our final first year eligible player is Marvin Harrison. Let’s begin by looking at Harrison’s numbers, and where they rank on the career lists.

Receptions	Receiving Yards	Receiving TDs	Receiving Yds/G	TDs
1102	14580	128	76.7	128
3rd	6th	5th	4th	9th

Additionally, Harrison was named to 8 straight Pro Bowls, was named a 1^st-Team All-Pro 3 times, was named a 2^nd Team All-Pro 5 times, and was selected to the 2000s All-Decade Team. He also caught a pass in all 190 games in which he played.

Receiving numbers have become increasingly inflated in recent years. As a result, it is more difficult to evaluate receivers. For example, let’s look at the following list of receivers with the most career 1000 yard receiving seasons:

Wide Receiver	Number of 1000 yard seasons
Jerry Rice	14
Randy Moss	10
Tim Brown	9
Terrell Owens	9
Jimmy Smith	9
Isaac Bruce	8
Cris Carter	8
Marvin Harrison	8
Torry Holt	8
Steve Largent	8
Derrick Mason	8
Rod Smith	8
Reggie Wayne	8

Only Steve Largent retired before the 2000s started. Most of these receivers are contemporaries and will compete with each other for the few Hall of Fame spots each year. I have stated before, “As time goes on, and more receivers appear on the ballot, they will continue to cancel each other out. I believe [Tim] Brown is viewed the least favorably of the three, so the voters must decide between [Andre] Reed and [Cris] Carter to help clear the upcoming logjam. Each has his supporters among the voters. Due to his postseason success compared to the others, Reed seemingly is the most likely of the three to gain entry. With that obstacle removed, Carter would be inducted the following year, as his acrobatic sideline catches are too great to ignore. But can they do so before Moss and Owens appear on the ballot? If not, these three receivers may have a very long wait.” Well, obviously I was wrong yet again. Carter made it in first. But will Reed now get in? Harrison is a formidable obstacle to Reed. Although receiving numbers are inflated in this generation, Harrison’s numbers are overwhelming.

What hurts Marvin Harrison, oddly enough, is that he made the game of football look too easy. He and Peyton Manning were virtually unstoppable, though they only won 1 Super Bowl. Some have criticized Harrison’s credentials by saying he played with Manning. Of the 22 modern era Hall of Fame wide receivers, 14 caught most of their touchdown passes by Hall of Fame quarterbacks. In fact, let’s look at the table.

Receiver	Quarterback	TDs
Lance Alworth	John Hadl	56
Raymond Berry	Johnny Unitas*	63
Fred Biletnikoff	Daryle Lamonica	41
Cris Carter	Randall Cunningham	31
Tom Fears	Norm van Brocklin*	20
Bob Hayes	Don Meredith	36
Elroy Hirsch	Norm van Brocklin*	32
Michael Irvin	Troy Aikman*	49
Charlie Joiner	Dan Fouts*	34
Steve Largent	Dave Krieg	46
Dante Lavelli	Otto Graham*	57
James Lofton	Lynn Dickey	32
Don Maynard	Joe Namath*	42
Tommy McDonald	Sonny Jurgensen*	30
Bobby Mitchell	Sonny Jurgensen*	29
Art Monk	Mark Rypien	26
Pete Pihos	Tommy Thompson	26
Jerry Rice	Steve Young*	85
John Stallworth	Terry Bradshaw*	44
Lynn Swann	Terry Bradshaw*	49
Charley Taylor	Sonny Jurgensen*	53
Paul Warfield	Bob Griese*	29

* denotes Hall of Fame quarterback

Kudos to Sonny Jurgensen for appearing on this list 3 times.

As the above table demonstrates, punishing Harrison for playing with Manning is ridiculous. In a previous post, we looked at Pro Bowl appearances and All-Pro teams among receivers, so we are not going to repeat that here. But not only was Harrison a 3-time 1^st Team All-Pro, 5 times he was a 2^nd Team All-Pro. That should be enough to get the nod over Andre Reed. Reed performed better in the postseason. Reed also had the misfortune of playing in Buffalo in the winter. But Harrison’s numbers are historically great. Part of the reason a receiver (Cris Carter) was selected this year, was the voters’ awareness of the growing backlog of receivers. Adding Harrison to the trio of Brown, Carter, and Reed would have been a nightmare for the voters.

So where do we stand?

The Class of 2014 will feature Derrick Brooks, Michael Strahan, Charles Haley, and then 2 of the 3 from Aeneas Williams, Marvin Harrison, or Jerome Bettis. We don’t like to hedge our bets at the Highway to Hall so we will say Williams and Harrison are the final 2 selections.

A look at our list again:

Derrick Brooks

Michael Strahan

Charles Haley

Aeneas Williams

Marvin Harrison

As always, we reserve the right to evaluate this class over the next 11 months (particularly if Walter Jones is eligible). [Note: He is eligible and our predictions have changed]. Feel free to leave any comments. But remember, these are our predictions on what will happen, not what should happen.