Doors to UF’s Hall of Fame could use grease
If you want to start an argument, bring up a Hall of Fame and who should get in.
Like baseball and the steroid monsters. Or rock ‘n' roll and bands like Foreigner and Bad Company.
Like the Florida Athletic Hall of Fame and a whole bunch of ex-Gators.
The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame quelled one debate a couple of weeks ago when it said Foreigner had finally made it in. A few days earlier, the UF hall announced its 2024 class.
All nine inductees are legitimate, but the interminable wait to join them is bothering the Bad Companys.
They don't want to talk publicly about it. They know the world has bigger injustices to deal with than ex-jocks feeling their college exploits aren't properly recognized.
And UF's hall strives to be one big, happy orange-and-blue family. Nobody wants to come off as the kid banging on a high chair.
“A bunch of them have strong feelings about this,” one HOF member said. “They just keep them to themselves.” In a way, that's a good thing.
“It's supposed to be hard to get into the hall of fame,” said Phil Pharr, the executive director of Gator Boosters who oversees the selection process for the F Club.
It's just gotten too hard, and the system could use a few tweaks.
To understand them, you need a little history lesson. The hall started in 1968. There were maybe 10 sports — all male — and no set criteria for hall-offame consideration.
After about 15 years of smoke-filledroom voting, the selection criteria were formalized. There are three categories:
Gator Greats, which honors letterwinners for their athletic exploits. Distinguished Letterwinners, which recognizes them for other contributions to UF. Honorary Letterwinners, which honors coaches and other support personnel.
Nominations go to a 30-member selection committee made up of letterwinners. The annual class is announced every April and usually comprises seven Gator Greats, one Distinguished Letterwinner and one Honorary Letterwinner.
Nine is not enough.
This year's Gator Greats consisted of two softball players, two swimmers/ divers, one football player, one baseball player, one men's basketball player and women's track athlete.
No offense to swimming, but should it have twice as many inductees as football?
The math isn't logical. A sport with 85 scholarships is going to produce more candidates than one with 13.
Maybe that explains how Jack Jackson, the 1994 SEC Offensive Player of the Year, isn't in the UF hall. Talk about a head scratcher.
Overall, UF now has 21 sports with approximately 700 athletes. Yet its hall of fame classes are the same size as 30 years ago.
Two-thirds of UF sports won't have any inductees each year. There's not enough room.
This isn't a case of Dolly Parton getting into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame ahead of Bad Company or Boston or Jethro Tull. (Dolly's great, but she belongs in the Rock Hall about as much as Mick Jagger belongs in the Country Music Hall of Fame).
Expanding the class to 12 or 15 wouldn't dilute the quality. And the HOF banquet could be streamlined to where it wouldn't last till 3 a.m.
Then there's the selection criteria. You must have been a first team AllAmerican or first team All-SEC to even be considered.
That means a guy like Dametri Hill has no chance.
He was a key member of UF's first Final Four team in 1994, averaging 17.6 points and 7.8 rebounds.
Hill was also a cult hero, dropping from a 350-pound freshman to a 6foot-7, 280-pound wrecking ball. His go-to hook shot earned him the nickname “Da Meat Hook.”
You can't write the history of Florida basketball without a couple of paragraphs on Hill.
But he was relegated to second team All-SEC center 30 years ago because a couple of coaches voted for Mississippi State's Erick Dampier.
The first team All-SEC requirement eliminates a lot of arduous subjectivity. But it also eliminates some worthy candidates.
Finally, it's tough to judge a swimmer against a soccer player against a linebacker. The HOF should consider breaking one selection committee into three or four, each with more specific expertise on the sports they are assigned.
That might eliminate some of the mental horse trading that goes on now. Though there will never be a fool-proof selection process.
“There is no silver bullet,” said Lee McGriff, a 1991 inductee.
The good news is the F Club is open to suggestions.
“We're not going to make everybody happy every year,” Pharr said. “But if we can make it better, we'll try to make it better.”
Maybe the 2025 UF Athletic Hall of Fame class will be bigger and better than ever. Then we can move on to getting Bad Company into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.
David Whitley is The Gainesville Sun's sports columnist. Contact him at dwhitley@gannett.com. Follow him on X @DavidEWhitley