HOF Friday

Goose, I'm going to take the reigns here for one Friday and pose a Hall Of Fame question to the Lodge. Is "Neon" Deion Sanders a Hall Of Famer? Is he a first ballot HOF? What does the Lodge think? After Sanders turned into a player for hire, he was both a Cowboy and a Redskin, throwing that bias out the window for Jimbo & Goose. On February 13 of this year, Deion retired for the second and final time. "Primetime" was on Quite Frankly with some guy this past Tuesday, still talking big & flashing style, of course, now it's with his mouth & clothes instead of his game. How ESPN fit the 2 large heads of Steven A. Smith and Deion Sanders in the same room is a mystery to me.

The knock on Deion throughout his career was that he was soft against the run. Do ya'll agree? And do you think this "hole" in his game should keep him out of the HOF? To that same question, posed by Steven A. Smith, Sanders replied with, "When your game is strong, they have to find something wrong." Clever, Deion. Another example of how Sanders mouth & massive ego probably will take some HOF votes away from his cause come voting time. But I think his career numbers & game changing play do hold up his story.

Drafted 5th in 1989 NFL Draft out of Florida State, Deion Sanders was an 8 time Pro Bowl selection, the NFL Defensive Player of the Year in 1994, and won a Super Bowl with the 49ers that same year. Hate him or love him, you had to admit that he changed the game in his prime, so to speak. Deion's ego probably fueled his move into a two-sport "star" playing in MLB. He never was an All-Star as a part-time baseball player, but he is the only man to have played in a MLB and NFL game during the same day, and is also the only player to play in both a Super Bowl and World Series.

While on Quite Frankly, Deion said he eventually wants to be Head Coach in the NFL. Do you believe it? I don't. I just can't believe his ego won't get the way of being a "company man" for an NFL franchise. An NFL Head Coach needs to check his ego at the door at times, and I don't believe Deion can ever do that. That's why he hung it up finally after this past season. "Primetime" was no longer what his nickname claimed and his ego couldn't take it. That being said, I believe Deion Sanders is a first ballot Hall Of Famer. He dominated the game for around a decade, he changed the game when he was on the field, both defensively and returning punts. Sure, he probably changed the game in bad ways too with his antics. But Sanders is a HOF. Like a 50 Cent prose... hate it or love it.