The NFL establishment will gather in Canton, Ohio, next weekend, and I submit to you that it is time — past time, in fact — for the General, John McClain, and his fellow selectors to present Ed Sabol, founder of NFL Films, as a candidate for the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

If you have followed this feature, you’ve heard plenty about Sabol and his son, Steve, his successor as president of NFL Films, and you’ll hear more as long as this forum is available to me. NFL Films is the standard of excellence for sports filmmaking. It has, in many ways, created the mythology that is the foundation of pro football’s enduring appeal.

Ed Sabol was a clothing salesman and amateur photographer in Philadelphia who, on a whim, entered the winning bid to film the 1962 title game between the Packers and Giants. Two years later, the NFL bought Sabol’s Blair Motion Pictures to chronicle the entire league as NFL Films. The company is now headquartered in Mount Laurel, N.J., but its original office in Philadelphia as of this month bears a historical marker from the state of Pennsylvania

“We’re right up there with Independence Hall and the Liberty Bell,” Steve Sabol said.

Ed Sabol is 93 and still in good health. But his wife, Audrey, tells him when he talks about this ache or that pain, “Stop complaining. The warranty on you ran out 20 years ago.” So much more the reason he should be considered for membership in the Hall of Fame immediately, if not sooner.

“If you look up the phrase ‘contributor’ in the dictionary, it seems to me that my dad’s name would be next to it,” Steve Sabol said. “He contributed to promoting the game, and now that company he founded is preserving the game and the history of the sport.”

Sabol, however, understands the reluctance of selectors to take away a Hall of Fame position from a former player or coach.

“If it comes down between Earl Campbell and Thurman Thomas and Ed Sabol, you’re always going to go with a player,” he said. “But there should be, maybe once every two years, a codicil where the Hall could go with six players and a contributor. I think my dad would be automatic.

“I must have had 15 Hall of Fame selectors tell me they think my dad should be in the Hall of Fame. People can’t believe he isn’t. But, going back to that term ‘contributor,’ it’s a perfect definition of what my father has done.”

AFL tribute on tap

Truth be told, Steve Sabol belongs in the Hall of Fame, too. At 67, he’s still bustling with ideas for continuing projects, including the next edition of Hard Knocks for HBO featuring the Cincinnati Bengals, or new shows such as an upcoming multi-part series on the history of the AFL.

“That one is going to be a VCR alert,” Sabol said. “We’ve got players I’ve been waiting to interview for 20 to 30 years.”

Sabol also continues to host NFL Films Presents, which airs on ESPN and NFL Network. He does not, however, participate in the panel that selects the pecking order for the NFL Top 10 series that airs on the network.

“I want to do my own top 10s,” he said. “The show is very popular, but I’m saving up for a Steve Sabol’s Top 10, Maybe when I’m 70, the NFL Network will grant me a half-hour to look back on 50 years of the NFL.”

Considering that Walter Cronkite got eight hours for Cronkite Remembers, which aired recently on Discovery Channel and is available on DVD, I’d say Sabol deserves more than a half-hour for his golden anniversary special.

On the way next week from NFL Films and Warner Home Video, by the way, is Run for the Championship: 2008 Season in Review. It’s actually the 2008 edition of Road to the Super Bowl, the venerable NFL Films staple that debuted in 1974 and has won 28 Sports Emmys, followed by the Super Bowl highlight film.