CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Standing just off the edge of Glory Road and staring at the big board, the first place my mind went was to Roy Hendrick.
Standing in virtually the same spot at the NASCAR Hall of Fame one year ago, I had met and exchanged pleasantries with some members of the family of Ray Hendrick, who from the short tracks of Virginia became known as “Mr. Modified” and one of NASCAR’s greatest regional racers ever. I had spoken with them about having seen Ray’s famous “Flying 11” at the Hendrick Motorsports Museum just about a day or so prior, wished them luck and then felt sorry afterward that they had come out to the Hall of Fame just to be left disappointed that Ray would have to wait until next year.
Thankfully, Ray Hendrick was voted into the Hall of Fame on Tuesday night (May 20), and the members of the Hendrick clan who had made the trip to uptown Charlotte were rewarded for waiting one more year. But watching as the video commemorating Ray Hendrick’s career played, I thought of how it was one year too late for Roy Hendrick — Ray’s son and a great short track racer in his own right, who died last August at the age of 71.
Before Roy’s plight, a large part of my sympathy for the Hendrick family was informed by chance meeting with them and also with the general pity I felt for those figures who were not named to the Hall of Fame’s Class of 2025. One year ago, Ricky Rudd and Carl Edwards were the two fortunate candidates to make the Hall of Fame before a logjam of virtual first-ballot locks entered their first year of eligibility: Kurt Busch, eligible beginning in 2025, was named to the Hall of Fame on his first try. In 2026, it’ll be Kevin Harvick‘s turn to go in on rollerskates — the same way Martin Truex Jr. likely will come 2027.
As it stands, that leaves just one spot on the Hall of Fame’s modern era ballot and one spot on the pioneer ballot up for grabs in any given year. And knowing that, it highlights a qualm I have with the current state of affairs of NASCAR’s permanent shrine to its greatest drivers along Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard in the Queen City.
Beginning in 2021, after spending the first decade of the Hall of Fame inducting five new members each year, NASCAR began to limit each new class of the Hall of Fame to three members, two from the sport’s modern era and one whose career began in or prior to 1966. On the surface, the decision makes plenty of sense. After all, the list of Hall of Fame candidates in NASCAR is much smaller than those in the NFL, MLB and the like, and limiting the amount of candidates who make the Hall of Fame is a good way to ensure NASCAR doesn’t run out of inductees anytime soon.
But that decision in the name of greater exclusivity also came just after the careers of Dale Earnhardt Jr., Jimmie Johnson, Matt Kenseth and others who had certain special benefits came to a close. By and large, those drivers as well as other recent Hall of Fame inductees like Chad Knaus had the benefit of having their entire careers play out in a modern media landscape, and at a time in which most all members of the current Hall of Fame voting committee witnessed the entirety of their careers from start to finish.
That’s not to say that the Hall of Fame voting committee is ignorant of the careers of those from past generations, but memories are a powerful force. And there are many who remember the championships won by Johnson, Kenseth and Busch or the primes of Dale Jr. and Edwards far better than they remember Harry Hyde or Larry Phillips or Ray Fox. And those memories — in a psychological effect you may know as recency bias — tilt the scales in favor of those whose careers played out in the last quarter century to the detriment of those great racers — or their descendants — who are still waiting for their name to be called.
Considering how much of a hold recency bias has given who’s up for the Hall of Fame the next several years, I wish there were some way for more deserving candidates — particularly not those necessarily top of mind — to make the Hall of Fame. I should think it shouldn’t be too difficult, and in fact, I’d probably be satisfied by something as simple as just opening up the pioneer ballot to two nominees each year instead of just one. Especially given the list of names like Phillips, Fox, Banjo Matthews and others who likely would have made the Hall of Fame long ago had NASCAR not only introduced its own equivalent to Canton and Cooperstown in 2010.
And before you start hitting me with the cries of, “It’s not the ‘Hall of Very Good!'” — I get and respect that the Hall of Fame warrants exclusivity and allowing only the best of the best. But I also think it shouldn’t be made too difficult for the greats to make the Hall of Fame, and it’s my belief that the day each Hall of Fame class is announced in any sport should be marked by celebration and not controversy. I don’t want the NASCAR Hall of Fame to resemble the Baseball Hall of Fame, which plays politics to the point that Derek Jeter wasn’t a unanimous first-ballot selection. Nor do I want it to resemble the Pro Football Hall of Fame, which told Luke Kuechly — by my and many other accounts, the greatest middle linebacker of his generation — to wait at least one more year because his decision to retire early made his career “too short” (Playing only eight years didn’t seem to be a problem for Dick Butkus, but that’s another argument for another day on another website.)
It shouldn’t have taken Kenny Stabler dying for him to make the Pro Football Hall of Fame, and it shouldn’t have taken Pete Rose’s passing (whatever his faults were) for him to earn consideration for Cooperstown. And from where I was standing on Tuesday night, even as I saw three very worthy names be called to the Hall, I shouldn’t have been left with the feeling that I wished Roy Hendrick had gotten to see his father pass a NASCAR Hall of Fame process that had kept him out until now.
