Lewis, Moss, Owens, Urlacher lead new class
MINNEAPOLIS — Ray Lewis and Brian Urlacher terrorized opposing offenses from the middle of the field. Randy Moss and Terrell Owens did the same to defenses on the outside.
The two hard-hitting linebackers and two bigplay receivers highlighted an eight-person class voted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame on Saturday. Safety Brian Dawkins also received at least 80 percent support from the 47 Hall of Fame voters, along with contributor Bobby Beathard and senior nominees Jerry Kramer and Robert Brazile.
But the biggest stars of the class are the two linebackers that made it on their first tries, and the pair of lightning-rod receivers who sometimes caused as many problems for their own teams as for the opposition. Moss also made it on his first try while Owens needed to wait for his third year on the ballot to get enough support.
“I’ve been going a long time. And now I can finally rest,” Lewis said. “I want to go fishing with a cigar now and just sit back. I don’t want to work out every day now.”
Moss and Owens each played for five teams in their careers as they often wore out their welcome with their inability to get along with teammates and coaches at times.
But at their best, there were few players ever able to strike fear in defenses as much as Moss and Owens, who were both all-decade selections for the 2000s.
“The door knocked and I started getting excited,” Moss said of Hall of Fame president David Baker alerting him he had been elected. “All the emotions caught the best of me because it’s been a long journey and it ends in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. Tears of joy.”
Moss burst on the scene as a rookie in Minnesota in 1998 when he caught a league-leading 17 TD catches and helped lead the Vikings to the NFC title game. His combination of speed and athleticism made him the game’s most dangerous big-play threat and led to the phrase “You got Mossed” for embarrassed defensive backs. He led the NFL in TD catches five times, including his record 23 for New England in 2007.
Owens, who didn’t attend the announcement,
ranks second to Jerry Rice with 15,934 yards receiving and is third on the all-time touchdowns receiving list with 153.
Lewis is widely considered one of the greatest middle linebackers, winning two AP Defensive Player of the Year awards and earning eight All-Pro selections. He anchored a dominant defense for the 2000 Baltimore Ravens in a season that ended with him winning Super Bowl MVP, then retired as a champion after Baltimore closed his last season with a title win over San Francisco in February 2013.
Lewis’ career was also marked by legal problems off the field. He pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge of obstruction of justice after initially being charged with murder in connection with two killings following a Super Bowl party in Atlanta in January 2000. Lewis was also fined $250,000 by the NFL.
Urlacher wasn’t far behind Lewis with his play on the field and is the latest in a line of great Chicago middle linebackers to make the Hall, joining Dick Butkus, Mike Singletary and Bill George. He was the Defensive Player of the Year of 2005 and joined Lewis on the 2000s all-decade team.
Dawkins spent most of his 16-year career in Philadelphia, earning five firstteam All-Pro selections for his versatility that included 37 career interceptions and 26 career sacks.
Kramer got passed over 10 times previously as a finalist before finally getting enough votes as a senior to become the 14th member of the Vince Lombardi Packers to make the Hall.