In wrapping up our three part series on the Hall of Fame potential of the Carolina Panthers Players, we’re going to take a look at the chance Julius Peppers has of getting into Canton.

Excluding last season, Julius Peppers has been a beast in Carolina, racking up 54.5 sacks in five seasons, putting Peppers up there with the league’s elite, but for whatever reason Peppers fell apart last season, collecting only 2.5 sacks. I’m not going to dive into all of the possible reasons why Peppers played so bad, that’s a whole other story, I’m simply going to look at his chances of having Hall of Fame numbers by the end of his career.

Right now there are 14 defensive ends in the Hall of Fame, but the thing is, the NFL did not record sacks until 1982, which means that there really isn’t a bar for how many sacks Julius Peppers needs to shoot for. If Peppers rebounds next season and the seasons following, Peppers would need to keep up the same pace he had in his first five seasons, for the next 10 seasons, for him to have any type of numbers close to hall of fame worthy. Peppers will need to put up some pretty impressive seasons, I’m talking 18 or 20 sacks, if he wants to be considered for the Hall of Fame. I’m not saying he can’t do it, with his power years still to come, Peppers might be able to, but with the chance of injuries, poor play by your teammates (means Peppers is double teamed), or a mystery bug, it just isn’t likely.

Another thing hindering Peppers is the number of players in front of him to be selected, Bruce Smith (all time sack leader) and Michael Strahan to name a few, have yet to be inducted, as well as quite a few others. If Peppers was to end up with l50 sacks, there would still be a long list of players in front of him that are Hall of Fame worthy. The bottom line is that Peppers chances really dropped because of last season, and he needs to have some phenomenal seasons in order to have any shot at getting into Canton.

Hall of Fame Chance: 15%

Tags: carolina panthers, julius peppers, panther