What we have to realize here is that Cris Carter hasn’t been rejected forever. He’s been rejected as a first-time ballot entry. Only the true no-brainers ever get in on the first ballot. Witness Paul Tagliabue. The list of viable Hall candidates who don’t get in on the first ballot is HUGE. Carter will get in next year, or the year after at the latest.
And Art Monk, who IMHO should have been in a long time ago, got in on his eighth year of eligibility.
So Cris Carter will still get in ahead of Monk in a sense. Monk retired earlier, so he got in earlier. That’s all.
One comment about Monk and the press: There was speculation that it took so long because he wasn’t loved by the press. He wasn’t a jerk to anybody, but he was (and is) intensely private. Didn’t give interviews. This was a form of payback for not being media-friendly, some may argue.
The Patriot were NEVER “fellated” before they won their first Super Bowl. SINCE then, I grant you, they have received utterly fawning press, which is a big part of the reason so many people have come to hate them. (I get so sick of the PEter Kings gushing about what great “character” guys Randy Moss and Rodney Harrison are, and how great it is that the Pats win “the right way”). But they got no attention before their current run of championships, and will get no further attention once that run comes to its inevitable end.
Same with the Colts- they’ve gotten ltos of media attention since Peyton Manning tuened them into perennial contenders, but they got no attention before that, and will get no further attention once they decline.
The Giants NEVER get “fellated.” You’re confusing them with the Yankees. Apart from the Yankees, New York teams have little or no following outside the NYC metro area. Giants gear has NEVER sold outside the NYC metro area. And the Giants were almost NEVER on Monday Night Football over the past ten years.
There are only two NFL teams that ALWAYS get way too much media attention and adulation, whether they’re good or lousy: the Dallas Cowboys and the Green Bay Packers.
I’ve lost track of how many times Brett Favre has turned victory into defeat with a dumb interception or a bad read… but no braodcaster ever calls him on it. It’s always, “Boy, isn’t he having fun out there?”