The Pro Football Hall of Fame enshrines its Class of 2026 in Canton on Saturday. Eli Manning won't be there. He has been a finalist in each of his two years of eligibility and has come up short both times, and one of his former teammates isn't happy about it.
Jeremy Shockey, who spent six seasons with the Giants and four of them catching passes from Manning, sat down with Shannon Sharpe on "Club Shay Shay" and made his case for why Manning belongs in Canton.
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Jeremy Shockey Thinks Timing, Not Talent, Is Keeping Eli Manning Out
Shockey spent part of the conversation describing what it was actually like playing with Manning. He pushed back on the idea that Manning is some emotionless robot under center.
According to Shockey, that's just not the full picture. Behind the scenes, he says, Manning cares plenty. He just doesn't show it the way his brother Peyton does, or the way Drew Brees did in New Orleans.
"He's not that guy. He's not emotional," Shockey said
, before mimicking Manning's version of celebrating a big play. Even his biggest reaction, Shockey joked, still amounted to little more than a fist pump and a quiet "hell yeah, man."
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Then the conversation turned serious. Sharpe asked Shockey point-blank if he was surprised Manning hadn't gotten the call yet. Shockey didn't hold back.
"I think it's ridiculous because he definitely should be in because the influence he has with the NFL," Shockey told Sharpe.
He argued that Manning's impact stretches well past the stat sheet, pointing to the family's massive presence in commercials and how much that's boosted the league's revenue and salary cap over the years.
It's a fair argument, but it's not the lens Hall of Fame voters typically use. Manning's actual on-field numbers are a tough sell.
He finished 117-117 as a starter over 16 seasons, made four Pro Bowls, and was never named All-Pro. Not once. That last one is what voters keep circling back to, and no amount of January mythology erases it.
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But then there's the other side of the ledger, the side Shockey and Sharpe leaned on hard. Manning owns two Super Bowl MVPs, both earned by beating Tom Brady and the Patriots at the height of that dynasty.
There's a smaller number that cuts the other way. Six players in NFL history own multiple Super Bowl MVPs. Three of them were eligible and went in on the first ballot: Joe Montana, Terry Bradshaw, Bart Starr. Two more, Brady and Patrick Mahomes, are locks whenever they get there. Then there's Manning, twice a finalist, twice passed over.
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Sharpe brought that up directly, noting how rare it is for any quarterback to beat Brady once in the Super Bowl, let alone twice.
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"No one has ever been such an underdog and beat Tom. No one," Shockey said. "Or any in football, NFL, twice."
Shockey also floated a theory on why Manning keeps getting passed over, even with two rings and two Super Bowl MVPs to his name.
It's not personal, he suggested. It's traffic. Brees went in on the first ballot this year and gets his bust Saturday. Ben Roethlisberger becomes eligible for the Class of 2027, Tom Brady for 2028. The quarterback line into Canton is long and it isn't getting shorter. Getting stuck in it isn't the same as being unworthy.
Shockey pointed to that logic as a kind of silver lining. First ballot recognition matters, sure, but he argued the players who eventually get in after a longer wait are just as much a part of what built the league.
For now, Manning remains on the outside looking in, but Shockey believes he deserves a gold jacket, and he will get one eventually.
This article originally appeared on
Pro Football Network
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