Patriots Pro Football Hall of Fame Snubs: 10 New England Legends Who Deserve In

Yesterday, the NFL world was turned upside down when it was announced that former New England Patriots head coach Bill Belichick was not elected as a first-ballot Hall of Famer.

We can all agree that Belichick is deserving of Hall of Fame status — eight Super Bowl Championships as a head coach and coordinator, second all-time in wins — but that is not the root of what this discussion is, or should be.

Rather, Belichick’s first-year exclusion points to a deep-rooted bias against the Patriots franchise as a whole.

The Pro Football Hall of Fame voting committee’s decision-making over the course of years proves that there is a real and evident anti-Patriot bias when selecting members — and Belichick is just the most obvious and glaring example of that now.

When compared to other dynastic runs in NFL lore, it’s clear that New England athletes have been overlooked.

The Pittsburgh Steelers (1970’s) have 10 players, their head coach, and owner in as members of the Pro Football Hall of Fame. The San Francisco 49ers (1980’s) have six players, their head coach, and owner in. The Dallas Cowboys (1990’s) also have six players, their head coach, and owner in the Hall of Fame.

New England? As of today… they can lay claim to just two players: Ty Law and Richard Seymour.

Sure, others made stops in Foxboro. Randy Moss spent two-and-a-half of his 14 career seasons with the Patriots, Junior Seau was with New England in 2007, and Darrelle Revis won a Super Bowl with the Pats in 2014 — but those weren’t New England “lifers.”

Once upon a time, you might have been able to make the argument that New England’s dynastic run happened too recently for them to have a comparable number of Hall of Fame selections. But that argument falls apart now that we’re 25 years removed from their first title and other teams of the 2000’s have more inductions.

The 2000’s Indianapolis Colts already have four Hall of Famers (Peyton Manning, Edgerrin James, Marvin Harrison, Dwight Freeney), plus their coach (Tony Dungy) and a contributor (Bill Polian), with Reggie Wayne knocking on the door as a finalist in 2026.

The 2000’s San Diego Chargers have three players in the Hall of Fame (Seau, LaDanian Tomlinson, and Antonio Gates) with more on the way in Drew Brees (and potentially Philip Rivers... one day).

The 2000's Baltimore Ravens (Ray Lewis, Ed Reed, Jonathan Ogden) also have three Hall of Fame players.

Belichick’s exclusion is an eye-sore, sure. But the larger point is that he joins a growing list of Hall of Fame snubs from the Patriots dynasty runs that cannot be overlooked any further.

Today, we’re going to take a closer look at a list of New England Patriots who should be considered for Pro Football Hall of Fame induction — if voting was more legitimate and equitable.

This list will not include Belichick, Robert Kraft, or Tom Brady. For those guys, it’s more a matter of “when” they receive their gold jacket, not “if.”

Criteria for other selections will be based around the impact that player or contributor had on the field, and can be a combination of factors: overall statistical performance when compared to their peers in the same era, and importance to the success or failure of the team during their biggest moments. In other words: can we write the story of the NFL without this player?

For New England’s dynastic run, there’s also one more curveball to take into consideration. Dynasties of the 70’s, 80’s, and 90’s all won three championships and had at least five members inducted. The Patriots’ run spanned through the 2000’s and 2010’s — with the same owner, head coach, and quarterback — but entirely different supporting casts around them.

Logically, that would mean that New England would have roughly 10 Hall of Famers spread across six championships in two decades. To make things nice and round for our list, we’ll stick with 10 total.

Finally, it’s important to note that these selections are in no particular order.

Without further ado, these are the Patriots who should be receiving further consideration for gold jackets:

Rodney Harrison has been a finalist for the Pro Football Hall of Fame for several years, still without receiving the nod.

Over the course of his 15-year NFL career with the Chargers (nine years) and Patriots (five years), Harrison essentially created the prototype for the modern “box safety.” He was a two-time First-Team All-Pro and a two-time Super Bowl champion who brought a rare mix of coverage, tackling, sacks, and turnovers.

He’s credited with the most career sacks by a defensive back (30.5), and is one of two players in NFL history to record 30+ sacks and 30+ interceptions (34) in his career.

The only other player on that list, Ray Lewis, was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 2018.

In the postseason, Harrison became the centerpiece of a physically dominant Patriots defense in the early 2000’s. He recorded seven-career postseason interceptions and holds the Super Bowl record with 34 tackles across three appearances.

Yes, his reputation was “polarizing” as an extremely physical player who pushed the limits of the rulebook, but Harrison checks every box for the Hall of Fame: elite honors (multiple All-Pro selections), unmatched DB pressure production, and signature postseason performance — exactly the mix that historically ages well in Canton debates.

Rob Gronkowski has the easiest Hall of Fame argument on this list, and may be the only one that even Patriot-haters won’t push back on.

He’s got the “best in the league” stamps all over his résumé: 4× First-Team All-Pro, on the NFL 2010s All-Decade Team, and the NFL 100th Anniversary All-Time Team.

The numbers match the accolades: 621 receptions, 9,286 yards, 92 touchdowns. Most importantly are the playoff stats — these always get lost in “regular-season” debates, and are much more relevant to many of the Hall of Fame’s (and the Patriots’) candidates: 98 catches, 1,389 yards, 15 touchdowns.

Those 15 postseason receiving touchdowns are the kind of impact that puts you in the “this guy changed playoff outcomes” category. Defensive coordinators didn’t gameplan to “cover” Gronk. They gameplanned to survive him — and they rarely did.

Brady-Gronkowski is the NFL’s most productive duo in Super Bowl history, with the two connecting on an NFL record 14 touchdown passes in the NFL’s grand finale.

At his peak, Gronk wasn’t just the best tight end in football… he was the matchup problem that rewired how defenses lined up, and how modern offenses utilize the tight end position in the passing game.

That’s a first-ballot story — or at least, I think so. I guess you never really can tell nowadays.

If we’re doing the Patriots Hall of Fame pipeline and Adam Vinatieri isn’t on the list, we’re missing the entire point of the early dynasty.

He’s not just “a great kicker.” He’s the NFL’s all-time leading scorer (2,673 points) and the all-time leader in field goals made (599) — the two cleanest, most unarguable kicker stats there are.

Then, add the hardware: four Super Bowl championships, three First-Team All-Pro selections, and placement on both the NFL 2000s All-Decade Team and the NFL’s 100th Anniversary All-Time Team.

The moments matter here, too, because Vinatieri’s biggest swings came in the biggest moments. En route to New England’s first Super Bowl victory, he hit two kicks of near-impossible probability (45 yards to tie with under a minute left, then 23 yards in overtime to win) to lift the Patriots over the Oakland Raiders in the “Snow Bowl.”

To follow that up, he hit a 48-yard field goal as time expired in Super Bowl XXXVI, kicking the Patriots to their first world title on a defining kick in modern NFL history. His game-winner was first last-second, game-winning field goal in Super Bowl history. Two years later in Super Bowl XXXVIII, he nailed the 41-yard game-winner to deliver another ring.

You can’t tell the Patriots’ story without those kicks, and you can’t tell the NFL’s last quarter-century without them either.

Yes, “he’s a kicker,” and kickers live in a weird Hall space where people act like the position is a footnote — and that’s probably the only reason he didn’t get elected as a first-ballot Hall of Famer in the first place.

But Vinatieri isn’t a specialist with a couple famous moments — he’s a record holder with longevity and playoff production. He’s credited with 56 career postseason field goals and 238 postseason points, which speaks to sustained value in the exact environment where every point is magnified.

If the Hall is about defining your era and delivering in championship moments, Vinatieri isn’t borderline. He’s the standard.

If you want to understand why the Patriots dynasty actually worked, Dante Scarnecchia is one of the answers. 34 seasons with the organization. Five Super Bowl championships. Multiple eras, multiple quarterbacks, different skill groups, different schemes… and the same thing kept showing up: an offensive line that anchored the attack when it mattered.

That’s what separates Scar from “great position coach” talk. Offensive line play is the most fragile thing in the sport — one injury, one weak link, and the entire offense changes. The Patriots had turnover everywhere, but Scar’s lines were consistently functional at worst and elite at best, which is why his name carries the kind of weight it does in league circles. He even received the Pro Football Hall of Fame Awards of Excellence as an assistant coach — that’s Canton basically acknowledging, “we see the impact, even if it’s not in a box score.”

With Scarnecchia coaching, Belichick was able to take swings on players that wouldn’t have received second looks from other organizations and turn them into stars. Sixth-rounders, seventh-rounders, undrafted free agents, and sometimes even collegiate wrestlers.

Case in point: Stephen Neal — a two-time National Champion wrestler at Cal State Bakersfield and two-time gold medalist at the Pan American Games and World Championships — never played college football, went undrafted, and then the Patriots signed him to work with Scarnecchia. Under Scar, Neal didn’t just learn how to play football; he developed into a 7-year starter anchoring the right side of the New England offensive line and earned Second-Team All-Pro in 2009.

Sure, assistants don’t get in easily, and line coaching is hard to “sell” to casual voters. But that’s exactly why the contributor lane exists.

Scarnecchia wasn’t a nice story — he was a competitive advantage for decades. If we’re serious about the Hall being about the people who shaped winning, he’s on the short list.

Vrabel has recently made his case much more compelling as a Hall of Famer, and may be one that is more “the sum of its parts.” His Hall argument doesn’t fit neatly in one box, because he’s affected winning in multiple ways.

As a player, he put up linebacker numbers that read like a Swiss Army knife: 57 sacks, 722 tackles, 11 interceptions, 20 forced fumbles. But let’s not forget his 10 touchdown receptions(!) as a linebacker. No, that’s not a typo. He was a real piece of what New England did in that first championship wave, and was used on offense in some of the team’s biggest moments, including three touchdown receptions in the Super Bowl. As for his accolades… three Super Bowl titles, plus All-Pro (2007) and a Pro Bowl (2007).

Then you add the coaching layer — awards, recognition, and a legitimate track record of building an identity as a head coach, including NFL Coach of the Year (2021). He turned the Tennessee Titans into a first-seed in the AFC Playoffs with an NFL record 91 players on their roster that year, and made it to an AFC Championship with them separately.

Now back as the head coach of the Patriots, Vrabel has rapidly accelerated his path to Canton.

In his first year with New England, Vrabel turned the team around from a combined 8-26 in 2023-24 to now 17-3 in 2025. With the Patriots headed for Super Bowl LX in February, Vrabel became the first coach in NFL history to take a team to the Super Bowl one year removed from a four-win season. He also became the first person in NFL history to start a Super Bowl as a player, then take that same team to the Super Bowl as a head coach.

Not many people have a résumé that can credibly argue “high-level winner on the field” and “top-of-the-profession on the sideline.”

The counter is also fair: Canton usually treats playing and coaching as separate conversations. But even if you keep it clean and judge him as a player, the production + rings + versatility profile is strong. And if you allow the full “football life” view, Vrabel becomes one of the more unique candidates we’ve had in a while — someone who mattered in two different jobs at the highest level.

Willie McGinest is one of those guys whose Hall case gets better the deeper you go into the postseason history books. The baseline is already strong: 86 career sacks and three Super Bowls in New England. He wasn’t a passenger on those teams, either — he was one of the defining edges of the early dynasty defenses, and a player who’s largely credited for creating the winning locker room culture that defined those Patriots teams.

But McGinest’s real argument lies in the playoff production. McGinest owns the NFL record for career playoff sacks (16.0), and he also posted an NFL single-game playoff record 4.5 sacks. That’s not “pretty good in January.” That’s “nobody has ever done it better when the stakes are highest.” For a pass rusher, that’s basically the purest Hall of Fame currency there is.

The pushback is usually about regular-season honors — only two Pro Bowls, not a pile of First-Team All-Pros. Fine. But the Hall has always had room for guys who defined postseason football, and McGinest’s résumé is as clean as it gets: historic playoff sack production, rings, and a role that translates directly to why those Patriots teams won in January and February on the regular.

Tedy Bruschi is one of those Patriots you can’t explain with just one stat line, because the story is bigger than that. Bruschi was the heart and soul of the Patriots’ defense in the early 2000’s. He was their captain, their leader, and right in the middle of all the action.

In February of 2005, Bruschi’s career — and life — were jeopardized when he suffered a major ischemic stroke. Many thought his playing days had been numbered. Instead, he came back seemingly stronger than ever, winning the NFL’s Comeback Player of the Year in 2005 and playing three more seasons at arguably his highest level.

Stories aside, Bruschi still has the accolades to make an argument for Hall of Fame consideration as a three-time Super Bowl champion, a Pro Bowler, and two Second-Team All-Pro selections.

His career totals reinforce the profile: 1,074 tackles, 30.5 sacks, 13 interceptions. That’s a three-down linebacker résumé — run defense, pressure, and enough coverage/playmaking to matter. And it lines up with what people remember: Bruschi wasn’t flashy, but the defense felt different when he wasn’t out there.

No, Bruschi wasn’t a perennial First-Team All-Pro, and compared to the most decorated linebackers ever, the résumé looks less gaudy. But that’s where context matters. Bruschi stacked real honors, played at the center of championship defenses, and authored one of the defining comeback seasons in NFL memory.

If the Hall is about impact and recognition, he checks more boxes than people want to admit.

Logan Mankins is the type of Hall candidate offensive line fans will fight for, because the résumé is exactly what you’re supposed to have at guard: 7 Pro Bowls, First-Team All-Pro (2010), multiple other All-Pro selections, and the NFL 2010s All-Decade Team.

Mankins also had the durability and consistency you need to see from a Hall lineman: 161 games started in 161 games played. It doesn’t get much better than that — the kind of “set it and forget it” reliability that enables the entire unit to function around him. And it’s not like he never played on big stages either; he has 17 career playoff games on the résumé, which matters when you’re talking about players who lived in the postseason.

The argument against Mankins: no Super Bowl ring. But that’s not a legitimate criticism of him as an individual player — that’s just timing. For an interior offensive lineman, honors are the pathway, and Mankins has the profile that historically gets guys in: All-Pro, All-Decade, and a decade-long run as one of the best at his position.

Lawyer Milloy is one of the most underrated “era safety” cases in the Patriots orbit. The honors are legitimate: First-Team All-Pro (1999), Second-Team All-Pro (1998), 4× Pro Bowler, and a Super Bowl XXXVI ring. That’s not just local hype — the league was telling you, repeatedly, that he was one of the best safeties in football.

And the production holds up across a long career: 1,439 tackles, 21 sacks, 25 interceptions. Milloy was a leader who brought tenacity, tackle volume, pressure ability, and takeaways. He wasn’t just a centerfielder; he was involved in everything.

The counter is that the safety conversation is always crowded, and his name can get lost among louder candidates. Even on this list, Harrison will likely be inducted before the league gets around to recognizing Milloy. But All-Pro matters here — it’s the cleanest signal that you weren’t just “good,” you were elite at your peak.

If you’re trying to tell the story of that transition into the early dynasty defenses, Milloy’s footprint is right there.

Vince Wilfork is the classic “if you watched him, you know” Hall of Fame candidate — and the best part is he still has the hardware to back it up: two Super Bowl championships, First-Team All-Pro (2012), four Second-Team All-Pros, and five Pro Bowls. That’s massive recognition for an interior defensive lineman, whose job often isn’t to chase sacks.

Yes, the career totals are modest by Hall standards — 560 tackles and 16 sacks — but that’s the point. Wilfork’s value wasn’t in hunting the quarterback like an edge. His value was in collapsing everything on the interior.

Wilfork may truly be the last of a dying breed: a two-gapping run-stuffer who played exclusively over the center. He erased inside run lanes, forced offenses to build their plan around him, and made life easier for everyone behind him. That kind of player changes your entire defensive architecture, and it made New England an elite run-stopping unit for a decade.

The counterpoint is always, “not enough splash stats.” But again — look at the All-Pros. The league doesn’t hand out that many All-Pro nods to a nose tackle unless the impact is obvious on film every week.

Wilfork was the anchor, the tone, and the reason those defenses could play the way they played.

This always seems to be a “hot-button” debate, so let me start with this: sure, Julian Edelman didn’t have the Pro Bowls, nor does he possess a traditional Hall-of-Fame regular-season volume for a wide receiver (620 receptions, 6,822 yards, 36 touchdowns).

But with Edelman, the argument isn’t in the numbers. If it were, this spot would have been reserved for Wes Welker (903 receptions, 9,924 yards, 50 touchdowns).

With Edelman, it’s the signature moments: the double-pass in the 2014 Divisional Round comeback over the Baltimore Ravens. The game-winning touchdown catch in Super Bowl XLIX. Arguably the greatest catch in Super Bowl history in the 28-3 comeback in Super Bowl LI. The “Third-and-Edelman” conversions in the 2019 AFC Championship Game in Kansas City. The Super Bowl LIII performance against the Rams.

And the hardware: three Super Bowl titles, plus Super Bowl LIII MVP with 10 catches for 141 yards.

Edelman is the ultimate “January résumé” Hall candidate. The playoff numbers are the argument: 118 career playoff receptions and 1,442 career playoff receiving yards — both top-two all-time when he retired. The list of players ahead of him? Jerry Rice. That’s it. That’s the list.

That’s not “good postseason receiver.” That’s one of the most prolific playoff receivers in NFL history, period.

Edelman wasn’t a gadget player who got hot — he was a featured piece of a constantly morphing Patriots offense for years, who turned into an X-factor when it mattered most.

Canton has room for players who authored a historic postseason résumé and had defining Super Bowl moments. Edelman has both — and you cannot write the story of the league’s greatest dynasty without him.

Sure, some of these guys may be better classified as “Patriots Hall of Famers,” rather than Pro Football Hall of Famers. And in large part, they’ve already received that honor.

But when stacking up the Patriots dynasty to those of the NFL’s past, New England’s success far surpasses that of the old regime — and it seems like Hall of Fame voters are a little sore about that.

There is no reason that after 20 years of dominance, nine Super Bowl appearances, and six Super Bowl Championships, New England has just two Hall of Famers to show for it.

Yes, Belichick was snubbed this year… but it wasn’t just him. The vast majority of the Patriots’ dynastic pillars are experiencing the same cold shoulder. At this point, it’s more of an indictment on Hall of Fame voters — and the entity as a whole for enabling it to continue — that the greatest dynasty in league history isn’t properly represented in a place solely dedicated to just that: league history.

Maybe with Belichick’s exclusion, the Hall of Fame will finally feel pressure enough to change its ways. But I’m not holding my breath.

Who do you think deserves to be in the Hall of Fame from the 2000’s/2010’s Patriots dynasty? Who am I forgetting?

Let me know in the comments below!

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