When it comes to Eli Manning's candidacy, your opinion does not matter. Mike Tanier's doesn't either. Find out whose opinion matters in this final installment of our Hall of Fame debate series.
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It doesn't matter whether or not you think Eli Manning belongs in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. My opinion does not matter, either. You may be surprised to learn that the current opinions of many of the Hall of Fame voters themselves also don't matter all that much.
When it comes to the Great Eli Manning Hall of Fame Debate, Bill Belichick's opinion is the one that matters.
At some point soon, a few of the senior voters on the selection committee, the aristocracy of my industry who have built strong relationships with the NFL's most important individuals, will solicit Belichick's opinion on Manning's candidacy. They will do so privately and off the record, so Belichick will feel comfortable speaking candidly.
Belichick might tell them something like this:
Golly, Eli was so ever-so-tough to prepare for! His regular-season statistics don't really capture how often he put the Giants in the right situation, got the ball to the right receiver, and did all the little things that make a quarterback truly great. I had to pull out all the stops in Super Bowl XLII and XLVI just to keep those games close, and he still got the better of us!
If Belichick provides this type of endorsement, it will sway the opinions of the skeptics and doubters on the committee, and Manning will sail into the Hall of Fame on the first ballot.
I think it's more likely that Belichick will say something like this:
C'mon, you saw those games. The Giants defense killed us, not Manning! He was no harder to prepare for than Jake Delhomme or Donovan McNabb in that first batch of Super Bowls. He was a fine quarterback, but he's no all-time great......"
Maybe a little more.
