On Tuesday, before the new Hall of Fame class was announced, Hall of Fame coach (and Hall of Fame voter) Tony Dungy declined to say whether he did or didn’t vote for his former rival, Bill Belichick.
On Sunday, during the NBC Super Bowl pregame show, Dungy again declined to comment on whether he voted for Belichick.
“I’m not going to disclose that,” Dungy said. “When you come on the committee, you take an oath that you’re not going to discuss any of the debates, anything that happened there. I’m not going to put any of my teammates under the bus who they voted for, who I voted for.”
The bylaws do not prohibit Hall of Fame voters from revealing their votes. They do require voters to “[h]old in strictest confidence all opinions expressed by Selectors during the annual selection meeting regarding the qualifications of the nominees.”
There’s no requirement to disclose the votes, however. And Dungy has every right to keep his vote to himself. It will prompt many (if not most) to believe he did not vote for Belichick.
And while the process is a big part of the problem, many (if not most) would say that, with voters expected to chose three Hall of Famers from a list of worthy candidates that consisted of Belichick, Robert Kraft, Ken Anderson, Roger Craig, and L.C. Greenwood, Belichick should have been the first name picked by all 50 voters.
Belichick wasn’t one of the three names on at least 40 of the ballots. And the outcome speaks for itself. As former Patriots safety Rodney Harrison said to Dungy during the Belichick segment, “You guys got it wrong.”