Well this is interesting.

As we all know, Terrell Owens skipped the Pro Football Hall of Fame ceremony in Canton, Ohio and had his own in Chattanooga, Tennessee at his alma mater. Apparently, the Hall is feeling a little embarrassed by the spectacle and wants to ensure that this does not happen again.

This news comes from Pro Football Talk, which reported that the institution wants to enforce a rule change that would force all inductees to attend the ceremony in Canton. It is not sure how they can enforce that though the speculation is that once a candidate reaches the Semi-Finalist stage they would have to sign a waiver stating that they would attend the ceremony.

In our eyes, this is a strange action by the Pro Football Hall of Fame. During Owens’ speech he stated that the reason he boycotted Canton was that he was protesting the Hall of Fame selection process, which he viewed as flawed.

Specifically, he stated this during the ceremony:

“Many of you are probably wondering why we’re here, instead of Canton. I’d like to set the record straight. It’s about the mere fact that the sportswriters are not in alignment with the mission core values of the Hall of Fame. These writers disregarded the system, the criteria and by-laws and ultimately, the true meaning of the Hall of Fame and what it represents. I wanted to take a stand so the next gut coming after me will not have to go through what I, and others have gone through.”

Honestly, we here at Notinhalloffame.com have been vocal about our belief that Terrell Owens should have entered the Pro Football Hall of Fame on the first ballot with all due respect he wasn’t even close to being the person who had a long wait for enshrinement…that would be Jerry Kramer who waited decades and until this past weekend was the only member of the NFL 50th anniversary team not to be enshrined. If Owens feels snubbed, we wonder if he had a long conversation with Jerry Kramer on that subject.

We don’t think he did either.

Having said that the actions of Terrell Owens were his right to do. While we weren’t enamored of it the fact that the Pro Football Hall of Fame are now looking to create a policy to prevent this seems very totalitarian to us, especially considering that there was a good chance that what Terrell Owens did would be a “one-off” and that we are unlikely to see this again, but with the political climate of the NFL, unnecessary rules may not help potential inductees to “tow the line”.

Chances are that the T.O. Hall of Fame drama is over and it is unlikely that we will see this occur again…whether they try to enforce this or not.

As most of the regular visitors to Notinhalloffame.com are aware we are (very) slowly putting together our top 50 players of every franchise in the “Big 4” of North American sports. After that is completed we will take a look at how each organization honors their past players and executives.

As such, it is important to us that the Arizona Coyotes have announced that they will be retiring the number 19 of Shane Doan, which will make it the first time in team history where this has occurred. This will take place on February 24 during their home game against the Winnipeg Jets.

Drafted 7th overall by the original Winnipeg Jets, Doan played his first hockey game in 1995 and his final one in 2017 for the Arizona Coyotes. He would play all 1,540 of his games in the National Hockey League for the same franchise and is without question the greatest player the team ever had since they relocated to Arizona.

Doan would represent the Coyotes in two All Star Games and he scored 972 Points while holding virtually every scoring record for the organization.

While Doan’s number is the first to be retired the team has “honored numbers” from the team’s history, which include Bobby Hull, Dale Hawerchuk, Thomas Steen, Keith Tkachuk, Jeremy Roenick and Teppo Numminen.

We here at Notinhalloffame.com would like to congratulate Shane Doan for earning this prestigious honor.

As most of the regular visitors to Notinhalloffame.com are aware we are (very) slowly putting together our top 50 players of every franchise in the “Big 4” of North American sports. After that is completed we will take a look at how each organization honors their past players and executives.

As such, it is important to us that the Boston Bruins have announced that they will retire the number 16 of Rick Middleton on November 29 during their home game against the New York Islanders.

Middleton is the 11th player in the history of the Boston Bruins to have his jersey retired. He joins Lionel Hitchman, Aubrey Clapper, Eddie Shore, Milt Schmidt, Bobby Orr, John Bucyk, Phil Esposito, Ray Bourque, Terry O’Reilly and Cam Neely.

After playing his first two seasons with the New York Rangers, “Nifty” was traded to Boston where he instantly became a fan favorite. He would play twelve seasons in Boston where he was Point per Game player scoring 898 Points in 881 Games Played. Five times he was a forty Goal scorer, including the 1981-82 season where he put the puck in the net 51 times. That season he was a Second Team All Star and was named a Lady Byng Trophy winner. He was also a three time All Star.

We here at Notinhalloffame.com would like to congratulate Rick Middleton for earning this prestigious honor.

We have a major retirement to talk about in Hockey as Jarome Iginla has announced that he is retiring from the game after a very successful 20 year career.

After a very successful career in Junior Hockey where he was a two time Memorial Cup Champion with the Kamloops Blazers he joined the Calgary Flames where he was the 11th Draft Pick in 1995. Iginla made an instant impact for the Flames where he was the runner-up for the Calder Trophy and a few years later his offense exploded to where he was considered an elite player in the NHL.

In the 2001-02 season Iginla was the NHL’s leading scorer, while also leading the league in Goals. He would be name a First Team All Star and while he was the runner-up for the Hart Trophy, he did win the Lester B. Pearson Award, which is the MVP as awarded by the players of the National Hockey League. Two years later, Iginila would become the Flames Captain, which historically speaking made him the first black Captain in the NHL history. That season, Iginla took Calgary to the Stanley Cup Finals, though they would go down to defeat to the Tampa Bay Lightning.

Iginla would never see the Stanley Cup Finals again but he was still an elite player. In addition to the 2001-02 season where he was first a First Team All Star, he would receive that accolade two more times (2007-08 & 2008-09). He was also a Second Team All Star in the 2003-04 Season. Iginla would later play for Pittsburgh, Boston, Colorado and Los Angeles.

While he never won a Stanley Cup, Iginla was a major force on the International scene where he was a two time Olympic Gold Medalist twice (2002 & 2010) and the World Cup (2004).

Iginla retires with an even 1,300 Points and is the leading score all-time in Flames history.

In our eyes and many others, Iginla is likely to enter the Hockey Hall of Fame on the first ballot and he is likely to be ranked number one on our Notinhalloffame.com list.

We here at Notinhalloffame.com would like to wish Jarome Iginla the best in his post-playing career.