“I’m going to give him the same advice Cris Carter gave me in London this year,” Jared Allen began when asked if he expected to hear Kuechly’s name called (Carter waited six years to finally be elected). “The process can be frustrating, yes, but once you’re in, once you have the gold jacket, the process kind of fades, and you’re in. Look, I think, and even for myself, he doesn’t need it for validation. I didn’t need it for validation; I knew what I played for. I played this game for the respect of my peers and the respect of those who played before me, and I knew I had that. This is the cherry on top. It really is.
“But I’d be totally lying to you if I said it doesn’t get frustrating because you kind of get in this competitive, competitive mindset against other guys. You’re like, I love these guys. These are great guys. Why am I comparing notes 15 years later? This is stupid, but it gets you because we’re all competitors.
“So I would tell him, you know what, God will give it to you when you get it. He’s going to get in. I don’t think anybody has a doubt that he’s going to get in. But yeah, I think just try to breathe, ask questions about what the process is like. Because you kind of deal with the emotions based on the process that you experience, and you don’t realize that that process is complicated. It really is complicated, especially when you’re trying to take great players and say one’s greater than this person this year, how do you fit the mold? So now you kind of look back and you see the totality of which to tell people, hey, breathe, relax, try to enjoy it, and that’s all you can do.
“I empathize. I truly do, but I mean, he’s beyond deserving.”
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