Bill Belichick could be making a trip to the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio sooner than we imagined
A little over 60 years ago, 17 of the most influential figures of the first 40 years of professional football comprised the inaugural class that was inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio. That 1963 class included icons such as George Halas, Sammy Baugh, Curly Lambeau, Red Grange, Bronko Nagurski and Jim Thorpe, and since then, 361 more contributors to the game of football have had their induction, including a 2024 Hall of Fame class made up of stars such as Julius Peppers, Dwight Freeney, Andre Johnson and Devin Hester.
Over the last six decades, the long hasn’t changed much in terms of who gets inducted, what the process of induction looks like, and how long individuals need to wait before entering the Pro Football Hall of Fame. But that all changed on Friday morning, when the Pro Football Hall of Fame announced that the five-year wait between retirement and induction has now only necessary for former players. Coaches, on the other hand, need to only be out of the league for a single season before becoming Hall of Fame eligible, which opens the door for the most accomplished coach in professional football history to be inducted as soon as 2026.
“The Pro Football Hall of Fame clarified that the new bylaw allowing coaches to be eligible for induction after just one season out of the game will officially go into effect a year from now,” tweets NFL insider Ari Meirov. “This means coaches like Bill Belichick (and Pete Carroll) would be eligible for the Hall of Fame class of 2026.”
This bylaw makes so much sense, it’s actually astonishing that the powers that be didn’t think to make this change even earlier. It allows long-tenured former coaches — or, if I don’t need to be so polite, we can just use the word “old” — to enter the Pro Football Hall of Fame with a quicker turnaround following the conclusion of their coaching careers. Case in point: Bill Belichick and Pete Carroll are both 72 years old and both out of the NFL, so why not make sure they both get their moment of glory in Canton, Ohio before they’re well into their late-70s? Don’t we know for sure that Carroll, and Belichick in particular, will walk into the Hall of Fame the first time they were on the ballot?
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Bill Belichick’s Pro Football Hall of Fame credentials
Perhaps this section would be better suited as an ode to the Hall of Fame credentials of both Belichick and Carroll, but in fairness to Belichick, comparing him to Pete Carroll is like comparing Secretariat to another horse that won just the Kentucky Derby.
Bill Belichick has accomplished so much in the NFL, he could have his own wing of the Pro Football Hall of Fame. He’s a two-time Super Bowl champion as the New York Giants’ defensive coordinator, a six-time Super Bowl champ with as the head coach of the New England Patriots, and he’s the third-winningest coach in the history of the NFL. No matter what you think of Belichick, Tom Brady, or the New England Patriots personally, the Hoodie’s Hall of Fame resume is absolutely staggering.
And while this may not be a traditional qualification for the Pro Football Hall of Fame, it should be mentioned that there might not be another soul alive who loves the game of football more than Bill Belichick, and honestly, I think that should count for something, even if Belichick would never need it to.