Roger Craig’s Long Wait Is Over. These Six Hall of Fame Snubs Are Still Waiting.
Roger Craig waited 28 years for his phone to ring. It finally did this year, and Saturday in Canton, Ohio, the three-time Super Bowl champion put on his gold jacket and became a Pro Football Hall of Famer at last. It should have been a pure celebration. Instead, Craig used his moment on stage to share something heavier: a diagnosis of vascular dementia, which he said his doctors believe “may be related, at least in part,” to concussions he sustained during his 11-year career. “The changes were gradual,” Craig said. “At first, they were easy to dismiss as normal aging. Over time, my family noticed it, too, and ultimately led us to seek answers from my doctor.” He added that the diagnosis “doesn’t define” him.
It was a stark reminder that a Hall of Fame call can come too late to matter the way it should. Craig got his call. Not everyone does.
A Deep 2027 Ballot, and a Long List Still Waiting
Next year’s ballot will be loaded. Rob Gronkowski, Adrian Peterson, Ben Roethlisberger, Richard Sherman, Antonio Brown and Andrew Whitworth headline a strong incoming class of first-time eligible players, while Bill Belichick and Robert Kraft return to the conversation after both were passed over in the 2026 vote. Not everyone on that list gets in — plenty of fans doubt Brown ever will — but the slots are limited, and the backlog behind them isn’t going anywhere.
That backlog includes players and executives who have been on the outside for years, in some cases decades. Here are six names who deserve a real look, whether next year or the year after that.
Torry Holt, WR
Three members of the “Greatest Show on Turf” have gold jackets. Torry Holt does not, despite being a Hall of Fame finalist for a seventh straight time. Voters clearly recognize what he did for the sport. They just haven’t ranked him ahead of the competition yet, and that’s worth pushing back on.
The No. 6 pick in the 1999 draft was part of a Super Bowl-winning rookie class from day one, catching 52 passes for 788 yards and six touchdowns in the regular season before adding 20 catches for 242 yards and a touchdown in that year’s playoff run. He broke out the following year and never really stopped — six straight seasons with 1,300-plus receiving yards, a mark few receivers in league history have matched.
Holt’s 11-year career is shorter than some of his statistical peers’, which puts him outside the top 15 in career receiving yards and outside the top 25 in catches. But peak production is its own case, and few receivers of his era were more dangerous at their best. The Greatest Show on Turf isn’t fully enshrined without him.
Steve Smith Sr., WR
Steve Smith Sr. should have been in Canton by now. The Panthers’ all-time leading receiver, listed at a supposedly undersized 5-foot-9, became the best wideout Carolina has ever had and then added a productive final act in Baltimore. Along the way, he made everyone around him better, including quarterback Jake Delhomme, who joined Smith in the Panthers’ Hall of Honor back in 2019.
Smith won the wide receiver Triple Crown in 2005 — leading the league in catches, yards and touchdowns — in an offense that ranked 29th in the NFL in passing attempts that season, and he did it one year after breaking his fibula. He was a First-Team All-Pro as a rookie returner in 2001 and again as a receiver in 2005, a rare kind of versatility.
He finished his career eighth all-time in receiving yards with 14,731 and inside the top 15 in career receptions with 1,031 — a résumé that stacks up against receivers who are already enshrined. The obstacle Smith can’t overcome on his own is the one that’s out of his hands: the vote.
Kevin Williams, DT
Fellow Vikings great Jim Marshall has waited even longer and deserves his own due for playing 282 consecutive games in an era with far less protection for players. But Kevin Williams had a genuinely dominant prime. He earned First-Team All-Pro honors in five of six seasons and finished his career with 63 sacks, 113 tackles for loss, 10 forced fumbles and 13 fumble recoveries.
Williams didn’t reach the Hall of Fame finalist stage until this most recent cycle. Part of the delay traces back to 2008, when he tested positive for a diuretic that can mask steroid use and was suspended two games after appealing an initial four-game penalty. There has never been concrete evidence he actually used performance-enhancing drugs, and it’s fair to weigh that context against a resume built on legitimate dominance in the trenches.
Williams retired after the 2015 season with career stops in Seattle and New Orleans following 11 seasons in Minnesota. His run defense, pass-rushing ability and All-Pro accolades stack up well, and if voters are torn between him and Marshall, there’s a real argument both belong in Canton eventually.
Don Klosterman, Executive
Some careers get overlooked for so long that people forget how significant they were. Don Klosterman is one of the most influential front-office minds in NFL history, and he barely registers when Hall of Fame ballots come out. A skiing accident ended his playing career and nearly killed him; what he built afterward in the front office is the more remarkable story.
Klosterman helped lure USC tackle Ron Mix and stars like Lance Alworth, Jack Kemp and Ernie Ladd to the Los Angeles Chargers in the AFL’s early years. He then moved to the Dallas Texans in 1962 — the franchise that became the Kansas City Chiefs — and pursued future Hall of Famers Bobby Bell and Buck Buchanan, helping build the roster that won the franchise’s first Super Bowl in 1970.
Klosterman didn’t stick around to see all of it pay off. He left to run the Houston Oilers, guiding them to two playoff appearances, then moved on to general manager jobs with the Baltimore Colts and Los Angeles Rams. The Colts won a title in his first year there, and the Rams put together the best stretch in franchise history under him — seven straight NFC West titles and a Super Bowl appearance in 1980. He capped his career by signing future 49ers legend Steve Young to the USFL’s Los Angeles Express. A career built on discovering and developing Hall of Famers deserves its own bust.
Joe Jacoby, OL
Individual honors alone don’t capture what Joe Jacoby meant to the Redskins. He earned three First-Team All-Pro selections across his career and four Pro Bowl trips, but it’s his stability across three different championship rosters that stands out most.
Washington won three Super Bowls in under a decade, and strong line play was a big reason why. Jacoby protected the blind side for both Joe Theismann and Doug Williams before sliding to right tackle to make room for fellow standout Jim Lachey. Through quarterback changes, a position switch and regular divisional matchups against Lawrence Taylor and Randy White, Jacoby held up. Joe Gibbs rightly gets credit for winning three Super Bowls with three different starting quarterbacks. His left tackle deserves the same recognition.
“The Hogs” remain one of the most iconic offensive lines in NFL history. The man who did much of the unglamorous work up front is still waiting on his gold jacket.
L.C. Greenwood, DE
This is the name most likely to get the response, “Wait, he’s not already in?” L.C. Greenwood, born in Canton, Mississippi, was a defensive end on Pittsburgh’s dynastic 1970s Steel Curtain defense and remains outside the Hall despite winning four Super Bowls in six seasons. Greenwood was named a finalist for the 2026 class — the first time in more than 40 years of eligibility — but ultimately lost out to Roger Craig, the only senior nominee elected this year. Greenwood died in 2013 at age 67 from kidney failure, so any future induction would be posthumous.
A 10th-round pick in the 1969 draft, Greenwood was one of the most underappreciated pieces of a defense that also featured “Mean” Joe Greene, Ernie Holmes and Dwight White. His signature moment came in Super Bowl X, when he sacked Cowboys quarterback Roger Staubach four times in a 21-17 win — still tied for the most sacks in a single Super Bowl. Across his 13-year career, all with Pittsburgh, Greenwood finished with an unofficial 78 sacks and 14 fumble recoveries.
He was overshadowed at times by bigger names on that same defense, but the production speaks for itself. Five of his Steel Curtain teammates are already enshrined. Greenwood’s family is still waiting for his turn.
