Sharpe: He'll Be a Hall of Famer, But Maybe Not This Year

It would be nice to say that Shannon Sharpe’s candidacy for the Pro Football Hall of Fame is a slam dunk. But the last two years have proven that not to be the case.

There remains no doubt that Sharpe, the league’s all-time leading pass-catcher among tight ends, will be enshrined in Canton at some point. But once again, others might have a better case this year among the 15 regular candidates (not including the two seniors candidates, who are voted on separately).

The basic problem for Sharpe is that there might not be enough room this year. Two seniors committee nominees, two likely first-year inductees, plus a contributor with heavy sentiment in his corner (Ed Sabol) and an offensive or defensive lineman could leave Sharpe scrapping for the final spot with Tim Brown, Andre Reed and Cris Carter, two of whom have been eligible longer than Sharpe.

Realistically, Sharpe’s chances this year are probably at about 45 percent.

Two of the five first-year candidates appear to be rubber-stamp, sure-fire inductees this year — running back Marshall Faulk and cornerback Deion Sanders. Faulk appears inarguable; he surpassed Lenny Moore and Thurman Thomas to become the best running/receiving combination threat from the running back position in NFL history.

Sanders’ proficiency is buried beneath his flash, but in his prime he was a shutdown corner in the same vein of Champ Bailey, and his impact upon his teams was profound. Would Steve Young have won a world championship without Deion Sanders with the 49ers in 1994? How about a third world title for Dallas if Sanders wasn’t with them in 1995 — especially since Kevin Smith was sidelined for much of that season? And Sanders is the only player in NFL history with at least five touchdowns on interception returns and punt returns for his career (he scored six times on punt runbacks and nine on interceptions).

The other first-year candidates — running backs Curtis Martin and Jerome Bettis and offensive lineman Willie Roaf — are more likely to wait. Bettis has a better case because he had a more distinctive style, and can be argued as the best power running back in the last quarter-century (since John Riggins’ retirement). Martin was exceptionally steady, but, like another consistent skill-position player (Curtis Martin), his time might be a while in coming.

Roaf is clearly a Hall of Famer — no eligible player with 10-plus Pro Bowl selections is not in the Hall, and Roaf racked up 11 — but sentiment appears to be in the corner of Steelers center Dermontti Dawson, who is in his third year as a finalist.

There is a glut of front-seven players who might be fighting for one spot for all practical purposes: defensive ends Richard Dent, Charles Haley and Chris Doleman and defensive tackle Cortez Kennedy. Dent, Haley and Doleman have been waiting the longest, having all retired in the 1990′s, but it’s Kennedy who has the best case, earning eight Pro Bowl nods in spite of playing his entire career with the then-sad sack Seahawks, who never finished better than 9-7 and only played in one playoff game during his 11 seasons there.

Kennedy also has the distinction of being the only player whose team won fewer than six games (in a non-strike season) to be the league’s defensive most valuable player; he won the award in 1992 despite his team enduring its worst-ever season (2-14). Haley, Dent and Doleman were teamed with solid-to-outstanding front-seven teammates who helped free them for sacks; Kennedy never had that luxury and still had 58 sacks from the inside.

For the sake of balance among the class, expect at least one of the offensive/defensive linemen to make the Hall of Fame, with Dawson and Kennedy being the favorites this year.

The real competition for Sharpe is among the wide receivers in this class — Tim Brown, Cris Carter and Andre Reed. Sharpe has a better case, but with the statistical standards for wide receivers changing, there is some urgency in the room about Brown, Carter and Reed and their long-term candidacies may never be better than they are now.

Sharpe might lose out to one of these three simply on political and logistical reasons alone. It might be unfair, but it’s the process.

Then there is Ed Sabol.

He is this year’s “cause candidate,” and justifiably so, given the immeasurable contribution of NFL Films to defining the presentation and growth of the sport. In the pre-cable TV era, when fans could only watch three or four NFL games and just one college game per week, Films’ productions were syndicated throughout the nation and became appointment viewing in expanding the audience beyond die-hard devotees to casual fans, while using slow-motion cameras and high angles to better explain the sport’s intricacies to the masses.

Television made the sport the juggernaut it is today, and no one was more important to this than Sabol, who grew Films from a home-based business into a powerhouse.

Sharpe played his position well, but Sabol was integral in transforming the NFL from a provincial, parochial collection of teams into a powerhouse whose logos and brands are recognized around the globe. Not too bad considering that the number of people who play the sport globally is a small fraction compared with how many people play soccer.

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