Zero Former Lions Make It to Second Round of Fan Hall of Fame Vote

by Sean Yuille on Dec 9, 2009 9:49 AM EST in Detroit Lions News

This post is sponsored by JCPenney/Van Heusen.

Back in October I put up a post mentioning Van Heusen Fan's Choice, which gave fans a chance to vote for who they thought should be Pro Football Hall of Fame finalists. The vote didn't officially count for anything, but upon completion, it was going to be interesting to compare how the fans voted to how the actual Board of Selectors voted. Well, we are now at that point, and the results from the first round of voting are in.

None of the six former Lions that were up for the vote made the top 25, which isn't at all surprising considering only Chris Spielman and Pat Swilling were in the top 100 at the time of my first post. I don't know where the former Lions ended up in the final rankings, but I doubt any of them were close to being in the top 25.

The most interesting thing about the list of 25 candidates who are still remaining (can be seen after the jump) is that the fans and Board of Selectors disagreed on 11 of the candidates. Only 14 candidates were found in both of the top 25s. What exactly that reveals about the differences between the fans and the Board of Selectors is beyond me (perhaps fans of some teams just voted more), but it is an interesting discussion nonetheless.

The next round of voting takes place until January and will narrow down the list of candidates to 15. To vote, click here.

1. Jerry Rice, WR - 20,599 votes

2. Emmitt Smith, RB - 17,523 votes

3. Ray Guy, P - 12,899 votes

4. Tim Brown, WR - 11,868 votes

5. Cris Carter, WR - 11,720 votes

6. Shannon Sharpe, TE - 11,048 votes

7. Otho Davis, Contrib. - Athletic Trainer - 8,360 votes

8. Jim Plunkett, QB - 7,807 votes

9. Richard Dent, DL - 6,387 votes

10. Lester Hayes, DB - 6,311 votes

11. Cliff Branch, WR - 6,246 votes

12. Tom Flores, Head Coach - 5,688 votes

13. Charles Haley, DL - 5,400 votes

14. Randall Cunningham, QB - 5,143 votes

15. QB Phil Simms, QB - 5,134 votes

16. Todd Christensen, TE - 5,040 votes

17. Steve Atwater, DB - 4,418 votes

18. Andre Reed, WR - 3,188 votes

19. Jim Tunney, Contrib. - 2,565 votes

20. Joe Theismann, QB - 2,530 votes

21. Ed "Too Tall" Jones, DL - 2,274 votes

22. Sterling Sharpe, WR - 2,168 votes

23. John Randle, DL - 2,097 votes

24. Steve Tasker, Special Teams - 1,857 votes

25. Kevin Greene, LB - 1,767 votes

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Comments

These people are either high or just plain stupid...

I mean a Punter in the top 3, I don’t wanna take anything away from Guy, but c’mon he’s a Punter & was a very good 1 for the Raiders. But Spielman was the man & Swilling was great w/ the Lions & Saints, members of the last good Lions D, all-be-it 15-20 years ago. Barry Sanders was arguable the best RB ever, he had only 2 Pro-Bowl OL, they still operate off that OL doesn’t matter mentality, & Emmit Smith had like 5 400lbs all-pro OL, put him behind an AZ OL, can’t remember if Lomas was still on that team, but it was a different story. What about Mel Gray, he was one of the best return guys ever.

by LTownDown on Dec 9, 2009 11:40 AM EST reply actions

Barry is already in the HOF

I think Spielman MIGHT eventually make it, but Pat Swilling was TERRIBLE in Detroit and awesome in New Orleans. He even played well after he left Detroit, but he sucked while he was here.

by KDawg on Dec 9, 2009 5:33 PM EST up reply actions