HOF expands opportunities for senior candidates

CANTON, Ohio – Senior candidates will have more options to be selected for the Pro Football Hall of Fame in the next three years.

The hall’s board of directors on Thursday approved several amendments to the bylaws for the selection of Hall of Fame enshrinees. In the past, only one player who was no longer in the modern era category could be voted into the sanctuary annually. However, for 2023-2025 classes, a maximum of three per year could be selected by the selection committee.

A deep backlog of leading candidates – players whose careers ended more than 25 years ago – led to a revision.

“Members of the selection committee have made it clear that they wanted to get more seniors ‘in the room’ for discussion,” said Jim Porter, the hall’s president. “From these initial conversations, the team of the Hall of Fame, who oversaw the selection process, worked with the board to create a path for the committee discussions that could lead to possible anchoring for more seniors.”

There is no guarantee three seniors will be selected each of the next three years. But there is now a broader path for them to be elected.

Through yet another amendment to the bylaws, 12 senior candidates will be presented to the hall’s senior committee, which means that more players’ careers will be discussed longer than at the previous selection meetings.

Also, a change for the next three election cycles merges the candidates from the category of coaches and the category of contributor. A finalist will be eligible from this combined group in the classes of 2023, 2024 and 2025.

No changes were made in the process of selecting modern players, those whose careers ended between five and 25 years before the election year.

With revisions to the next three classes potentially consist of nine people: up to five modern players, up to three seniors and up to a coach or contributor. Previous years had a maximum of eight.

This summer’s Hall of Fame inauguration is on August 6th.