Does Hall of Fame await Dungy?

Update: Added the thoughts of Sports Illustrated's Peter King, who responded to a question about Dungy's Hall of Fame chances in his Tuesday Morning Quarterback mailbag.
Update: Added a chart detailing the coaching records of Hall of Fame coaches.

Indianapolis Colts coach Tony Dungy retired Monday after a 31-year NFL career as both a player and a coach. He leaves with an impressive coaching resume: one Super Bowl victory, six consecutive seasons with 12-plus wins and 10 consecutive postseason berths, a post-merger record.

But will he make the Hall of Fame?

Dungy doesn't have instant Hall of Fame credentials -- he didn't rack up 200-plus wins, he didn't win three-plus NFL titles and he didn't fundamentally change the game. Coaches with those numbers to their credit, like Don Shula, Curly Lambeau and Tom Landry, are inducted almost immediately.

Other coaches with similar pedigrees to Dungy, however, were eventually inducted into Canton after a lengthy waiting period. George Allen was posthumously elected in 2002, 25 years after he retired, and John Madden didn't get in until 2006, 29 years after he left the game.

I haven't decided yet if I think Dungy should make the Hall of Fame, but I think he probably will. I'll explain why by quickly looking at the three criteria I think voters use: On-field performance, long-term impact on the NFL, and to a lesser degree, personal intangibles.

On-field performance

Dungy coached the Tampa Bay Buccaneers from 1996 to 2001 and the Indianapolis Colts from 2002 to 2008. He finished his 13-year head coaching career with a 139-69-0 regular season record and a 9-10 postseason record, including a victory in Super Bowl XLI. He also won Super Bowl XIII as a role player for the Pittsburgh Steelers, but of the 21 coaches inducted in the Hall of Fame, only the six pre-modern inductees (before 1946) are also recognized for their playing careers.

The Indianapolis Star chronicles how Dungy's coaching record ranks among the best ever in terms of career wins.

Of the other nine coaches with the top regular-season winning percentage, only two (Blanton Collier and George Siefert) aren't already in the Hall of Fame. Of the 13 coaches with 10-plus playoff appearances, only six aren't (Marty Schottenheimer, Mike Holmgren, Dungy, Chuck Knox, Bill Parcells, Bill Cowher). Of the 21 coaches with 130-plus wins only 10 aren't (Schottenheimer, Noll, Dan Reeves, Knox, Parcells, Holmgren, Cowher, Mike Shanahan, Dungy, Bill Belichick).

And many of those coaches are contemporaries, some of whom will certainly be inducted. But that is part of Dungy's problem. Because he is not a no-doubt-about-it Hall of Famer, his candidacy will be weighed against those of Belichick (3 NFL titles), Parcells (2), Shanahan (2) Holmgren (1), Shanahan (1), Cowher (1) and Schottenheimer (200-plus wins), who all have equally -- if not more -- compelling arguments.

Dungy, however, should be recognized for turning around the fortunes of two franchises that were among the laughingstocks of the league before he arrived. Tampa Bay had only two winning seasons among its first 20, but five during Dungy's seven years with the team. After moving to Indianapolis in 1984, the Colts only had two 10-win seasons in the 17 years before Dungy arrived -- they went seven-for-seven after. (It should be noted that all nine of those seasons came under the tutelage of future Hall of Fame quarterback Peyton Manning.)

Long-term NFL impact

This phenomena explains why the Hall of Fame is weighted to pre-merger coaches. By definition, they had the greatest potential to impact the future of the NFL, and several did by introducing things now considered basic -- the forward pass, the two-platoon system, film study, etc.

Nothing that crucial will be attached to Dungy's legacy, but his adaptation of the Cover 2 defense, and his low-key coaching attitude has already made an influence thanks to his coaching tree -- four of the 32 current NFL head coaches served as an assistant under Dungy. Most symbolic for many of the voters may be the fact that Dungy is the first black coach to win a Super Bowl.

Intangibles

This is where Dungy shines above the rest of his competition. Because media members vote on Hall of Famers, having a congenial relationship with the press can become the tipping point -- for or against -- a candidate's induction.

Upon Dungy's retirement, members of the media -- which tend to be critical, if not cynical -- posted opinions en masse that Dungy was a great person regardless of his success as a football coach. Impervious to an NFL growing more chaotic by the season, Dungy made time for his family, his players, and yes, the media during his entire career, and his friendly demeanor should serve him well when voting commences.

Sports Illustrated's Peter King, one of the 44 voters for the Hall of Fame (like Supreme Court justices, they cannot be removed -- they simply retire or die) had this to say about Dungy's chances in a recent column:

THE WORST THING TO DO IS CALL SOMEONE A LOCK, BUT I WOULD LEAN TOWARD DUNGY.
The Dungy case is very interesting, and I think the pioneering aspect of it is significant -- very significant. As a coach, Dungy has a good case -- 10 straight years of directing his team to the playoffs (both with a quarterback and without one), nine of his last 10 years winning double-digits, a Super Bowl title. As a pioneer, being the first black coach to win a Super Bowl is an important historic accomplishment in a league in which two-thirds of the players are black. For too long the league lagged far behind in the hiring of minorities to be head coaches. He's a beacon, and so many coaches from the NFL to Pop Warner look up to him as their primary role model. It's not quite Namath willing the AFL to a Super Bowl win and pro football equality, but I think it's close.