The NFL Hall of Fame Won't Announce Terrell Owens' Name at the Induction Ceremony

Source – Terrell Owens has clearly hurt the Pro Football Hall of Fame’s feelings.

Owens has decided to not attend the Hall of Fame’s induction ceremony, even though he’s part of this year’s class. The HOF has said that’s unprecedented. Instead, Owens has planned to give his speech at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, where he played his college ball.

Clearly that’s not what the Hall’s directors want. Induction weekend is a huge deal in Canton. They probably never considered that anyone would voluntarily skip their prestigious event.

So how will the Hall of Fame handle this unusual situation? In the most immature way possible. It appears they’ll act like Owens doesn’t exist.

In an interview with the Talk of Fame Network, Pro Football Hall of Fame executive director Joe Horrigan said Owens will not be mentioned during the gold jacket ceremony on Friday or the induction ceremony on Saturday. It seems that if you showed up in Canton on induction weekend after being on the moon for a year, you wouldn’t know Owens is in the Class of 2018.

“The focus is on the guys who are here,” Horrigan told the Talk of Fame Network.

It’s official. Terrell Owens is now the author of my favorite Hall of Fame induction in any sport, ever. It’s like watching family drama spill over into a wedding that would otherwise be just another dull, standard, textbook event. And it’s not your family. Seriously, nothing will cut through the tediousness and up the entertainment quotient faster than some good, old fashioned animosity. TO came at the Hall with his own unique brand of utterly self-absorbed, narcissistic dickishness. So Joe Horrigan fired back with a blast of weaponized passive-aggressiveness.

I mean, just a pure power move, you have to admire the audacity of it. Arguably no one in the history of the Football Player species ever lobbied harder to get inducted into Canton. And now that he’s in, he can’t be bothered to show up. So Joe Horrigan is not about to reward that kind of petulance by tainting his beloved induction ceremony with Owens’ name. You might call it immature. But to me, it’s diabolically brilliant.

Owen reminds me of the annoying kid with cooties who used to mess up my son and his friend’s Minecraft creations when they were 11 years old and they all hated him for it. But his mom begged for him to get a pity invite to my kid’s birthday party and laid the guilt on heavily, so we caved. And when the day came, the little shit was a no show. But the Irish Rose went and got him anyway. He got everything he wanted. Received all the negative attention. And contributed nothing to the day. Was no fun. Didn’t participate. Didn’t even bring a present. He just moped, didn’t take part in the Airsoft battle (which was epic, by the way), took his gift bag and went home. If I had it to do over again, I’d have pulled a Joe Horrigan. Just forgot the smelly little dirtbag existed and put all the focuse on the kids who appreciated the invitation, showed up and had a good time.

So snipe at my man Joe all you want. But I stand with him. The rules say they have to give every inductee a bust and a gold jacket. Nowhere is it written they have to introduce a guy who can’t be bother to show up. On the Immaturity Chessboard, that is a “check” by TO, “checkmate” by the Hall of Fame. And the one guarantee we have is this means Owens’ speech in Chattanooga is going to be lit.