The Pro Football Hall of Fame’s policy that family members of posthumously-inducted enshrinees won’t be permitted to speak at the ceremony was intended to streamline the event. The fact that plenty of the living enshrinees choose to drone on and on (and on) when at the podium only prolongs it.
After last year’s filibuster free-for-all, which featured too many speeches that went on for far too long, the Hall of Fame has spent plenty of time communicating the preferred duration to this year’s new entries.
“We have emphasized to the guys the importance of keeping their speeches within the 8-10 minute range,” Hall of Fame spokesman Joe Horrigan recently told PFT.