As is tradition every NBA All Star Weekend, the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame announces the Finalists for their impending Hall of Fame Class.

The Finalists are:

Hugh Evans (Referee):  Evans officiated nearly 2,000 regular season games and 170 playoff games in the NBA from 1972 to 2001.

Bill Fitch (Coach):  Fitch coached in the NBA for 25 seasons and he was named the Coach of the Year in 1976 and 1980.  In 1981, he would take the Boston Celtics to the NBA Championship.  

Marques Johnson (Player):  A five time All Star and First Team All NBA Selection in 1979, Marques Johnson was a champion at UCLA in 1975 and was named the National College Player of the Year in 1977.  He is ranked #29on Notinhalloffame.com.

Bobby Jones (Player):  Jones was named an All Defensive First Team player eight times (1977 to 1984) and was a member of the Philadelphia 76ers 1983 Championship Team.  Collegiately, Jones took the University of North Carolina to a Final Four in 1972.  He is ranked #14on Notinhalloffame.com. 

Sidney Moncrief (Player):A five time All Star (1982 to 1986), Sidney Moncrief was a two time NBA Defensive Player of the Year (1983 & 1984) was also an All-American at the University of Arkansas.  He is ranked #2 on Notinhalloffame.com.

Jack Sikma (Player):Sikma was chosen for seven straight All Star Games (1979 to 1985) and would help the Seattle SuperSonics win the NBA Championship in 1979.  He is ranked #3on Notinhalloffame.com. 

Eddie Sutton (Coach):Sutton is a four time National Coach of the Year (1977, 1978, 1986 & 1995) and he made history as the first coach to take four different schools to the National Tournament.  At present he is seventh all time in wins in the NCAA.

Ben Wallace (Player):  Wallace is a four time NBA Defensive Player of the Year (2002, 2003, 2005 & 2006) and a four time All Star (2003-06) would help the Detroit Pistons shock the world when they won the NBA Championship in 2004.  He is ranked #4on Notinhalloffame.com

Chris Webber (Player):  The leader of Michigan’s “Fab Five” would become a five time All Star (1997, 2000, 2001, 2002 & 2003) and a two time First Team All-NBA Selection.  He is ranked #1 on Notinhalloffame.com.

Paul Westphal (Player):  Westphal would help the Boston Celtics win the NBA Championship in 1974 and would later be chosen for five NBA All Star Games (1977-81) and earned three First Team All NBA Selections (1977, 1979 & 1980).  He is ranked #15 on Notinhalloffame.com.

The Women’s Committee Finalists are:

Leta Andrews (Coach):  Andrews coached high school basketball for over 50 years and would win multiple championships at that level.

Barbara Stevens (Coach):  Stevens is a veteran of college coaching for over 40 years and she has been a Division II National Coach of the Year five times and was a National Champion in 2014 with Bentley University.

Teresa Weatherspoon (Player):  A five time WNBA All Star (1999-2003), Weatherspoon was also a two time WNBA Defensive Player of the Year.   She was also a champion in the NCAA (Louisiana Tech 1988) and the Olympics (United States 1988)

The Naismith Class of 2019 will be announced during the Final Four.

With Kobe Bryant, Tim Duncan, Chris Bosh and Kevin Garnett on the horizon this is the year that the former players who are Finalists this year need to get enshrined for fear of a much longer waiting period.

We here at Notinhalloffame.com will certainly be paying close attention to what transpires next at the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame!

Sad news emerged from the world of Pro Wrestling as former Heavyweight Champion, Pedro Morales passed away today at the age of 76.

From Puerto Rico, Morales began wrestling in 1959 at the age of 17 and went right to work performing on the midcard all across the country.  He would first emerge on the main event scene in Los Angeles for the WWA where he would win the promotion’s Heavyweight Championship by defeating The Destroyer in 1965.  L.A. would be his main base of operations for the next few years where he would be a multi-time tag team champion and would also venture north to San Francisco where he and Pepper Gomez would be the tag team champions there.  After California, Morales ventured further west to Hawaii where he would stay for two years winning their Heavyweight Championship twice while also winning the tag titles on multiple occasions, but it was his next move, which would be where he would become most famous.

Morales joined the WWWF in 1970 and early in 1971 he would defeat Freddie Blassie in a tournament final to win their version of the United States Title.  The reigning World Heavyweight Champion, Bruno Sammartino was getting tired and he needed a break and requested time off and he would lose the championship to Ivan Koloff, who was meant to be an interim champion as McMahon saw money in Morales who drew the fervent Puerto Rican fanbase of New York City and he would defeat Koloff to become the World Wide Wrestling Federation Heavyweight Champion that year.  

While Morales title reign did not eclipse Bruno’s both in popularity and tenure, the 1,027 days at the top of the WWWF cemented him as a huge name not just among the Latino community but the wrestling one at large.  Morales would top the title to Stan Stasiak in 1973 so that Bruno could reclaim it nine days later and the Puerto Rican would stay in the WWWF for a couple more years before departing.

In the next five years Morales would travel across the country starring in San Francisco, the AWA, Championship Wrestling from Florida and in New Japan.  He would win titles everywhere where he was often at the top of the card but in 1980 he would return the WWF where he was positioned as the number two face in the company.  He would team with Bob Backlund at the Shea Stadium Show and defeat the Wild Samoans for the WWF Tag Team Championship, which he would only hold for one day as the WWF had a rule in place that did not allow double champions (Backlund was the WWF World Heavyweight Champion at the time).  Later in 1980, Morales defeated Ken Patera to win the WWF Intercontinental Champion and would become the first recognized Triple Crown winner in the organization.  He would lose the IC Title to Don Muraco in 1981 but would win it back from him a year later only to eventually lose it back to Muraco.

Morales would perform in Puerto Rico the next two years before returning to the WWF for a two year stint in a midcard role.  He would retire in 1987 and would be inducted into the then named WWF Hall of Fame in 1995.

We here at Notinhalloffame.com would like to extend our condolences to the friends, family and fans of Pedro Morales

We have a major update on Notinhalloffame.com as our annual list of those to consider for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

The first thing we did was remove the artists who were chosen for the Hall in the latest class. That group consisted of Radiohead (#1), Roxy Music (#5), The Cure (#11), Janet Jackson (#18), Def Leppard (#41), The Zombies (#85) and Stevie Nicks (#122).

The second thing we did is input the new artists who are eligible.  As they were already listed on our site on the Future Rock and Roll Hall of Fame eligible section, we took your existing votes and comments into consideration.

That segues perfectly into the third thing that we did, which was to look at the votes and comments that you made on the existing entrants on the list.  This matters to us and we adjusted accordingly.

As such, we are proud to present our new Top 10:

For the fourth time Kraftwerk returns to the #1 spot.  They have been nominated five times including last year.  They were ranked #2 last year and have never been lower than #3 since we started this website.

Oasis makes their debut at #2 making them the highest new artist on our list.  The British group are certainly Hall of Fame worthy however it is unlikely that the Gallagher brothers will show up should they be chosen.

Jethro Tull returns at #3.  To date, they have yet to be nominated for the Rock Hall despite being eligible since 1993.

The Smiths also hold steady at their same position at #4.  The Smiths have been nominated in 2015 and 2016 and have been eligible since 2008.

MC5 moved up one spot from #6 to #5.  The proto-punk group have been eligible since 1991 and have been nominated four times and the last three years.

The highest hip-hop act is now the Notorious B.I.G. who debuts at #6.  Like Oasis, there is an excellent chance that he could enter on his first year of eligibility.

Gram Parsons hold his position at #7.  Parsons has been eligible since 1992 and he has been nominated three times the last occurring in 2005.

Willie Nelson also remains with the same rank at #8.  Nelson has been eligible since 1986 and has never been nominated.

Judas Priest climbed one rung from #10 to #9.  The Heavy Metal outfit from the United Kingdom have been eligible since 1999 and were nominated once in 2018.

New Order swapped spots with Judas Priest and dropped to #10.  They have been eligible since 2006 and have never been nominated.

Weezer debuts at a high profile spot at #40 and Korn also joins them in the Top 50 with a debut at #49.  The Top 100 showcases Outkast at #59, Daft Punk at #71 and Marilyn Manson at #79.

The other new entries are Elliott Smith (#127), Jeff Buckley (#157), Nas (#174), Portishead (#215), The Fugees (#245), Usher (#293), Godspeed! You Black Emperor (#355). Aaliyah (#361), At the Drive-In (#375), Cake (#403), Supergrass (#413), Bush (#425), Ben Harper (#443), Tricky (#506) and Brandy (#534).

The entire list can be found here.

At present we are ranking 588 acts.  Longtime visitors know that when we began this a decade ago we only ranked 100 acts, grew it to 250 and eventually 500.  We have a long term goal of reaching 1,000 hence why when there are new entries we did not remove any to keep at an even 500.

For those wondering about our other list revisions we will have the Baseball and Football ones done shortly.

As always we thank you for your support and we encourage you to cast your votes and offer your opinions!

It is another big day for us at Notinhalloffame.com!

Regular visitors know that we also operate the Fictitious Athlete Hall of Fame and the Fictitious Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, the latter of which has been overhauled.  That necessitated a delay in announcing the newest members of the Fictitious Rock and Roll Hall, which we are proud to announce are Alvin & the Chipmunks and the Wonders.  

This group joins previous inductees Wyld Stallyns, Dr. Teeth and the Electric Mayhem, Gorillaz, Tenacious D, Spinal Tap, The Blues Brothers and The Monkees.

Like in previous years, the opening round began with over 500 Fictional Musicians which was reduced to 15 Finalists and then the two new inductees.  All voting is done online by the public.

The brainchild of Ross Bagdasarain Sr, Alvin & The Chipmunks was created in the late 1950’s who simply created the high pitched rodents by speeding the playback of his own voice. He gave his creation the name of Alvin & the Chipmunks, which would net him Grammy Awards for Engineering and two number one songs.

Bagdasarian Sr. adopted the more Caucasian sounding name of David Seville, who on the albums would use his own voice and would become the de facto caretaker of the Chipmunks who were now named Alvin, Simon and Theodore.  Incidentally, their first hit, “The Witch Doctor” did not actually feature the Chipmunks, rather the main voice was that of Seville and the sped up part was the catchy “Oo-ee, oo-ah-ah, ting-tang, walla-walla, bing bang” that would later be adopted by the Chipmunks.

You would think that this would be a one-hit wonder but it wasn’t.  Seville created a while album around the Chipmunks and he would give them personas of the precocious Alvin, bespectacled intellect Simon and the cheery and rotund Theodore were alive and well in anthropomorphic form. The album gave the world one of the most successful Christmas songs ever (aptly named, the Christmas Song).

Tom This threesome would star in television shows and later films and without question this is the most successful fictional acts in history

Alvin & Chipmunks are joined by the Wonders from the 1996 Tom Hanks film, That Thing You Do! Set in the early 60’s, The Wonders would become a one hit wonder (with the song title of the film’s name) and we would see their rise and fall over an innocent and fun flick.  The Wonders were comprised of drummer Guy “Shades” Patterson (Tom Everett Scott), lead vocalist and guitarist James “Jimmy” Mattingly II (Johnathon Schaech), guitarist Leonard “Lenny” Haise (Steve Zahn) and bass player T.B. Player (Ethan Embry).

With these two new entries it is now time to look at the 2019 Class.

You can vote for the Class of 2019 in our Preliminary Round here: https://www.notinhalloffame.com/ficitious-rock-and-roll-voting/2019-first-round

You know what we want you to do!

Cast your vote and tell us who should be in the next Fictitious Rock and Roll Hall of Fame class!

As always we here at Notinhalloffame.com thank you for your support!