Six first-year candidates are among the 27 modern-era semifinalists still alive for potential induction into the Pro Football Hall of Fame’s class of 2013.
Offensive linemen Jonathan Ogden and Larry Allen, defensive linemen Michael Strahan and Warren Sapp, kicker Morten Andersen and safety John Lynch make up an incredibly deep pool of first-year candidates still in contention. Another first-time semifinalist is Kansas City defensive back Albert Lewis, a four-time Pro Bowler and two-time First Team All-Pro who retired after the 1998 season.
Otherwise there were few major surprises in the announcement. The survivors also include three wide receivers, each of whom many voters and observers believe are qualified for Hall enshrinement, who seem to be canceling each other out in the final voting process: Andre Reed, Cris Carter and Tim Brown.
Disappearing from last year’s semifinalist lists from recent years include linebacker Clay Mathews, defensive back Donnie Shell and contributor Ron Wolf. One notable absence from the list is Steve Sabol, one of the forces behind NFL Films, who died from brain cancer in September. Sabol’s father, Ed Sabol, founded the company in 1962 and was enshrined in Canton in 2011.
Semifinalists RB Jerome Bettis, Roger Craig, Terrell Davis
WR Tim Brown, Cris Carter, Andre Reed
OL Larry Allen, Will Shields, Joe Jacoby, Jonathan Ogden
DL: Charles Haley, Warren Sapp, Michael Strahan
LB Karl Mecklenburg, Kevin Greene
DB: Steve Atwater, Albert Lewis, John Lynch, Aeneas Williams
K Morten Andersen
Special Teams: Steve Tasker
Coaches Don Coryell, Bill Parcells
Owners Edward DeBartolo Jr., Art Modell
Commissioner Paul Tagliabue
Contributor George Young
These modern-era candidates will be reduced to 15 finalists that will be announced in early January. That list will then be cut to 10 and then to five on the Saturday before the Super Bowl. Those five will be voted on individually for inclusion, as will two senior-era candidates, Curly Culp and Dave Robinson.
Between four and seven enshrinees will be selected for enshrinement. The final voting process takes place prior to the Super Bowl.
The inductees for the class of 2013 will be announced at the Super Bowl. They will be enshrined in August 2013. (We made our predictions here.)
As it turns out, Johnson is on pace for an 1828 yard season – just off the pace of Jerry Rice, who had 1848 in 1995. He’s just not getting in the end zone as much – he’s been tackled at the one yard line a ridiculous number of times – but he’s still having another monster year.
After seemingly taking a couple seasons to get acclimated to the NFL game after spending his college days at the wishbone stalwart Georgia Tech, Megatron has been on fire the last couple seasons. In 2011, he led the league in receiving yards with 1681, was second in touchdowns to Rob Gronkowski with 16 (Gronk had 17) and had 96 catches.
His stalwart numbers through the first six years of his career made me wonder how he stacked up with a couple of the league’s all-time greats. And yes, it appears as though these last couple amazingly prolific seasons have put Johnson right in the mix with the likes of Randy Moss and Jerry Rice, whose careers were compared on this site previously.
Barring injury, Johnson will eclipse Rice’s reception total for their first six years. Rice had 446. Johnson has 439 right now with five games left in the regular season for Detroit. He’ll likely fall just short of Rice in yardage, though he’s got a shot to catch him (7,129 with five games left to Rice’s 7,866). Rice’s 79 touchdowns through a half-dozen years has both Moss (77) and Megatron (53). (more…)
I’m not going to say the Atlanta Falcons are a bad team. At 9-1 they deserve more respect than that, but they may be the least convincing 9-1 team I’ve seen in awhile.
The offense remains explosive, but the team lost five picks to Arizona at home last weekend in a game that shouldn’t have been as close as four points. The run game is nonexistent and now news has leaked that an already injury-tainted offensive line will now be down Joe Hawley for four games due to a violation of the league’s substance abuse policy.
This isn’t a good thing for a team whose top runner has put up just 61 yards in the last two games. The defense isn’t much better either. LaRod Stephens-Howling broke the century mark and scored against this tackling-challenged bunch.
Truth be told, Atlanta’s impressive record has been built on close wins against less-than-stellar opponents. Six wins have been by a touchdown or less. And some of those victories have come against Kansas City, San Diego, Washington, Oakland, Philadelphia, Dallas and Arizona. (more…)
With the gay marriage amendment defeated during the election in Minnesota earlier this month, outspoken Vikings punter Chris Kluwe has found a new topic on which to opine: Ray Guy’s omission from the Pro Football Hall of Fame.
The arguments have gone both ways. He revolutionized the punter position. So he should be in. He’s just a punter, so he should stay out. He was great at pinning teams inside the 20 yard line so he should be in. His gross average wasn’t all that great so he should be out. As this Pro Football Reference blog post states, few players’ cases stir “as much passion and disagreement as Ray Guy.”
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100% agreed on the locks for the seniors if we had a fifth slot my pick would either be Matheson…
hard to say if momentum is gathering, but we had 10 seniors elected in 2020 centennial class, doesn't seem unreasonable…
I'm sold on 4 of them Brian not quite sold on Benton just yet
A special election could continue to gather momentum but it would probably only be 3-5 players at the most. Its…
Agreed like you said the direct elect option is the only way that the super seniors get in