NEWNow you can listen to Pak Gazette articles!
Football conversations leading up to Super Bowl LX have not focused on the game itself, but rather on the news that Bill Belichick, the legendary coach of the New England Patriots, will not be inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame on his first ballot.
The backlash received from the news leaking out of Canton has caused people like Tom Brady, Robert Kraft, Patrick Mahomes and many others to express their displeasure with the Hall selection committee.
But one former NFL quarterback believes the Hall of Fame can still “rectify” his “egregious mistake.”
CLICK HERE FOR MORE SPORTS COVERAGE ON PakGazette.Com
Then-New England Patriots head coach Bill Belichick during the second half of an NFL football game against the New Orleans Saints, Sunday, Oct. 8, 2023, in Foxborough, Massachusetts. (AP Photo/Michael Dwyer, File)
Dan Orlovsky, who now serves as an NFL analyst for ESPN, said Thursday on “First Take” that there is still time to make a change.
PRO FOOTBALL HALL OF FAME WARNS VOTERS AMID BILL BELICHICK OUTRAGE
In fact, he implores those in power to do so.
“What a great opportunity for the Hall of Fame to do the right thing. And I know: This is not the participation trophy they’re throwing out. There’s a new voting process. It’s obviously flawed,” he said on the show, according to Awful Anusing. “Why can’t the Hall of Fame step back and say, ‘Let’s review what really happened here and fix this’?
“There is not a single person who has come out who has given a justifiable reason for Coach Belichick not to be a first-ballot Hall of Famer. This is obviously a big deal. Unless someone does it, why can’t the Hall of Fame step back and say, ‘You know what? We re-evaluated it. Everyone makes a lot of good points. The process is flawed. Let’s make sure we do it the right way.’ Because the right thing to do is to have him as a Hall of Famer. of Fame on the first vote. I understand that everyone is in an uproar and says, ‘No, you can’t go back on the vote.’ Why not? “Why can’t the Hall of Fame do the right thing and realize what an egregious mistake has occurred?”
Obviously, this is something that has never happened to the Hall: changing the voting results of a candidate. But Orlovsky doesn’t care what happened in the past.
“Just because this has never happened before doesn’t mean it can’t happen in the future,” he added. “To everyone who sits there and says, ‘Well, personal bias had an impact,’ of course it did. You’re human beings. Believe me, when you vote for awards, bias will play its part. Bad blood shouldn’t, and at least according to reports, bad blood has played its part there.
Dan Orlovsky watches before Super Bowl LVII between the Kansas City Chiefs and the Philadelphia Eagles at State Farm Stadium on February 12, 2023 in Glendale, Arizona. (Carmen Mandato/Getty Images)
“The other part is this: Who’s next? Who’s next? Who’s going to be the next person to suffer the consequences of, ‘You were mean to me in the locker room?'”
Vahe Gregorian of the Kansas City Star wrote a Wednesday column revealing that he was one of at least 11 Hall of Fame voters who did not vote for Belichick. He is the only one who has done it.
While one report indicated that Belichick’s involvement in scandals with the Patriots, such as Spygate and Deflategate, could have led to him losing on the first ballot, Gregorian, who has been covering the league for nearly 40 years, said he felt “obliged” to cast his votes for the older candidates – Ken Anderson, Roger Craig and LC Greenwood – believing they were seeing possibly their last chances to make the Hall.
Belichick was part of a five-person group separate from the 15-person ballot of the modern era, in which each voter was tasked with selecting just three members to enter the Hall. Among them are three high-level candidates, a contributor (coincidentally it’s Patriots owner Robert Kraft), and a coach.
ESPN announcer Dan Orlovsky speaks before the game between the Baltimore Ravens and the Detroit Lions at M&T Bank Stadium on September 22, 2025, in Baltimore, Maryland. (G Fiume/Getty Images)
Can the Hall of Fame rectify the mistake as Orlovsky said? They have the power, but there’s no telling if they’re likely to do so before the news is confirmed on Feb. 5 during the NFL Honors, when the Class of 2026 heading to Canton is officially revealed.
Belichick has the second-most wins by a head coach of all time, trailing only the great Don Shula. Belichick won six Super Bowls in New England and two while defensive coordinator of the New York Giants.
