Projecting three future Hall of Famers for the Jacksonville Jaguars

The Pro Football Hall of Fame's class of 2023 will officially be inducted on Aug. 3.

With less than a month until the annual event in Canton, Ohio, we're examining which players — past and present — on the league's 32 teams we think will one day receive a similar honor.

Here are three Jacksonville Jaguars who should eventually receive football immortality:

Running back Fred Taylor

Taylor is one of those players who truly wasn’t appreciated in his own time. In his 11-year tenure with the Jaguars, he had seven 1,000-yard seasons, scored 62 touchdowns, led the league in rushing yards per game once, made one Pro Bowl, and was an All-Pro selection once. Taylor finished his career ranked 17th all-time in rushing yards (11,695) and 25th in rushing attempts (2,534). 

He had more yards than John Riggins, Joe Perry, Earl Campbell, Larry Csonka and Terrell Davis — all Hall of Famers — and more rushing touchdowns than Simpson, Csonka, Davis and Paul Hornung.

Taylor was named a Hall of Fame finalist for the first time in 2024. And though he ultimately wasn’t picked for induction, he broke a five-year streak of only being a semifinalist, which means HOF voters could be closer to putting Taylor in Canton.

Wide receiver Jimmy Smith

The Jags’ well is pretty dry when it comes to Hall of Fame hopefuls, and with Tony Boselli already in and Taylor knocking on the door, the team’s next-best bet is Smith. Like Taylor, he’s another player who wasn’t fully appreciated for how good he was while still playing. In 11 seasons in Jacksonville, Smith had 1,000 yards in every season but two. 

He finished his career with 862 catches, 12,287 yards and 67 touchdowns while making five Pro Bowls and being named an All-Pro twice. He ranks 26th all-time in receiving yards (more than Michael Irvin, Calvin Johnson and Lance Alworth) and 30th in receptions (more than Irvin, Alworth and Steve Largent), which is impressive considering he didn’t play the first three seasons of his career with the Cowboys.

Tight end Evan Engram

This one could be a long shot, but hear me out. In his two seasons catching passes from Trevor Lawrence, Engram, who’s only 29, has averaged 120.5 targets, 93.5 receptions and 864.5 yards per season. If he were to average that for another four seasons, he would rank fifth all-time among tight ends in receptions and ninth all-time in receiving yards.

And that would just put Engram into his age-32 season. Suppose he played another two or three years after that with even just average or slightly below-average numbers. In that case, I don’t see any reason why Engram couldn’t finish in the conversation of being one of the NFL’s top 10 TEs all-time.