Having a lot of fun doing our Baseball debates with two of my bloggers, DDT and the Phillies Archivist, I wanted to repeat the same idea with this year’s Football Finalists, but due to time constraints I will take a deeper look at each candidate myself and offer a few thoughts as to their Hall of Fame candidacy
Next, I take a look at former Head Coach, Tony Dungy.
Dungy has been a Finalist before for the Pro Football Hall of Fame and as a former Super Bowl winning Coach this shouldn’t be a surprise. Dungy coached for thirteen years in the NFL with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and the Indianapolis Colts and for eleven of those seasons he took his team to the Playoffs and would win it all in 2006 with the Colts.
Dungy’s overall regular season record of 136 and 69 is one of the best and he has long been highly regarded as one of the best and most popular coaches in recent memory. He has been revered for his calm teaching style and is one that many other coaches have openly looked to emulate.
He has also been known for giving back to the NFL after his career as a coach was over, assisting Michael Vick in getting back into the NFL, his philanthropic and community involvement is legendary. He has parlayed that likability factor into a successful analyst career with NBC.
There are however valid criticisms, and Dungy may not have done himself Hall of Fame favors when he openly decreed that he would not have drafted Michael Sam, citing his sexuality as a distraction. Also, Dungy did win a Super Bowl in Indianapolis, but it was Jon Gruden who took his previous team to the promised land. One Super Bowl may not cut it.
Recognizing that, if one of the three coaches (Dungy, Don Coryell and Jimmy Johnson) Dungy is the one who will probably get in…and probably this year, not that I would personally put him in right now, behind the other two.
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