It's official: HOF voters have their heads up their ass

The CHFF issued a challenge to the HOF voters over the past two years: vote in some fucking defensive players for once, will ya?

As CHFF readers know, offensive players have entered the Hall at a rate of nearly 2 to 1 over offensive players throughout the modern history of football, and at a remarkable 3-to-1 rate here in the Live Ball Era (since 1978).

We thought 2007 would be the year in which things would start to change. Sadly, amazingly, stupidly ... it's only gotten worse.

On Saturday, the HOF announced its six 2007 HOF inductuees. Their list includes FIVE offensive players and just ONE defensive player. Here's the list:

• DB Roger Werhli (Cardinals, 69-82)
• RB Thurman Thomas (Bills, Dolphins, 88-00)
• OL Bruce Matthews (Oilers, 83-01)
• WR Michael Irvin (simply does not belong ... and we'll crush anyone who dares challenge us on this) (Cowboys, 88-99)
• TE Charlie Sanders (Lions, 68-77)
• G Gene Hickerson (Browns, 58-73)

Like we said, that's 5-to-1 offensive players to defensive players.

For those of you keeping track at home, the count is now:

• 109 modern era offensive players in HOF
• 63 modern era defensive players in HOF
• That's 1.7 offensive players for every one defensive player in modern history (i.e., in two-platoon era)

Among Live Ball Era players, the count is now:

• 19 offensive players
• 6 defensive players
• That's 3.2 offensive players for every one defensive player

You tell us the HOF voters don't have their heads up their ass.

We wrote to SI's Peter King, a HOF voter, about this back in November, when the semifinalists were announced. His response:

"Good points. I will consider them. This has come up on several occasions. I'm in the Tippett camp." - Peter King

Apparently, King in the boys didn't consider things long enough. Otherwise, they would not have fucked up so royally and sent five offensive players to Canton and just one defensive player. It's unacceptable to anyone who takes football seriously.

Tippett, of course, is the former NE Patriots OLB whose stats compare farely well against those of Lawrence Taylor, the man who set the standard for the position, and one of just a handful of defenders we mentioned who obviously deserve consideration for the HOF (all of our defenders absolutely deserve to be in the HOF ahead of Irvin).

Let's just put it this way: relative to the standards set by the greatest players at their respective positions, Tippett deserves HOF consideration long before Michael Irvin. It's not even a question that AT is more deserving than Irvin.

Plus, AT hasn't been busted like 203 times for various drug offenses like Irvin.

See the full story on the idiocy here.