The fans got it wrong again.

Julian Edelman (11) makes a difficult catch in a 2014 game against Denver.

I have been a member of the Patriots Hall of Fame Nomination Committee since 2007, when the committee was founded. Of the 17 times the committee has met since then (we all missed the COVID year and it was unnecessary with Tom Brady), I have missed only one meeting, when work commitments got in the way.

And in all those years, I've been happy and honored to do my job -- to be involved in the nomination of three former players or coaches and then to let the fans finish the job by voting for the player they feel is most worthy of enshrinement.

Only twice have I felt with all my heart that the fans got it wrong. The first time was 2016, when Kevin Faulk was selected. The second time? This year.

On Monday, the Patriots announced that the fan balloting had chosen wide receiver Julian Edelman to become the 37th inductee to the team's hall of fame. Edelman outpolled another first-time nominee, kicker Adam Vinatieri, as well as offensive guard Logan Mankins, a three-time finalist.

Edelman was often the center of attention.

Before I say anything else, I want it clearly understood that I fully believe Julian Edelman is worthy of enshrinement. A former quarterback from Kent State, Edelman became one of the more clutch receivers in team history as well as a highly accomplished kick returner. He made quite possibly the greatest catch in Super Bowl history in Super Bowl 51 against the Atlanta Falcons, and was the MVP of another Super Bowl. He even played defensive back on more than a few occasions, and was always one of the more interesting and entertaining players that was able to radiate some personality out of an otherwise lead-lined locker room during the era of Bill Belichick's philosophy of radio silence to the outside world.

Yes, Edelman is worthy. But this year, I was certain that someone else was more worthy. Far more worthy.

Without Adam Vinatieri, there may have been no dynasty.

I have never shared the league-wide notion that kickers are not real athletes, and little more than a necessary evil. You've heard the jokes -- the big guys do all the grunt work, spilling blood and fending off pain, and then the little kicker runs on the field and says. "I keek a touchdown! I keek a touchdown!"

Vinatieri celebrates the winning kick in SB 36.

No, Adam Vinatieri was an athlete from Day One of his career. He was in rock-hard physical condition. He ran sprints and gassers before and after practices with the running backs and wide receivers, and not just prancing down the fields with the punters. He even ran down the United States of America's ambassador to the Bahamas, Herschel Walker, on a kick return in one of the league's more memorable special-teams plays in its history -- which, I assume, Walker has yet to live down.

But more than anything else, Vinatieri was clutch. He was money. He had ice in his veins -- especially when he nailed the two field goals against Oakland in the Snow Bowl at Foxboro Stadium that saved their bacon on the path to Super Bowl 36 in New Orleans. Those, and the game winning kick against the Rams, were the foundation of the first of two Patriot dynasties in the 21st century.

He spent 10 seasons with the Patriots and won two of their three Super Bowl championships in that period with late-game field goals. He had so many game-winning kicks in his career, I lost count. And for those who scream, "But he left the Patriots and played 14 more years for the Colts," I counter with the observation that it wasn't Vinatieri's choice. Bill Belichick had his ideas of what kind of money kickers should make, and after a decade in the league, Vinatieri was never going to be offered a contract by the penny-pinching Patriots that fully reflected his accomplishments and worth.

Clearly, Belichick undervalued this asset. Stephen Gostkowski, who succeeded Vinatieri, proved to be a very good kicker -- but he never attained the same level of "clutch" as his predecessor. Meanwhile, Vinatieri went on to become the NFL's all-time scoring leader. And yet, the Pro Football Hall of Fame still thumbed its nose at him during its last round of nominations.

We committee members aren't really supposed to reveal the actual deliberations that go on at our meetings, just as the actual vote totals -- both for our nominations, and the eventual fan balloting -- are not revealed to the public. Frankly, I think there should be more transparency in all of those areas. But I'm not afraid to reveal at least my involvement in the whole process.

I'm the one that stood first before the committee -- and the only one that actually stood, come to think of it -- to nominate Vinatieri for the ballot. I didn't bog down my brief oratory with a long list of statistics or minutia, but instead, I dedicated my comments to his place in team history -- the seminal moments when his actions rose above the game itself to become the stuff of NFL legend. It seemed a no-brainer to me, that the player that provided the Patriots with the most memorable moments in their history other than those authored by Tom Brady should be not just nominated, but immediately enshrined.

But even before I offered Vinatieri's name in nomination, there was already support for him in the room. New head coach Mike Vrabel had visited the suite to thank us for our participation in the process, and before he left, one of the committee members asked him which former player would have his support.

Vrabel stopped in his tracks and thought for a moment, then spoke. "Oh, Adam. Adam, of course," he said, also commenting on Vinatieri's reliability and toughness.

Several other players were nominated over the course of the meeting, and it was not at all surprising that Edelman would be nominated in his first year of eligibility. But the discussion quickly turned to whether Edelman's more recent popularity would give him an advantage among younger fans, and thus shut out the player that just about everyone in the room believed to be the most worthy candidate for this year.

Parcells: Finally in.

We were reminded by those in charge that our job was to nominate individuals because of our belief in their worthiness, and to not be concerned about whether that person would be voted in by the fans. That's a situation we've faced several times over the years, because we put Bill Parcells on the ballot so many times, knowing full well that bitter fans would claim that his negotiations with the Jets during the weeks before Super Bowl 31 automatically discounted his actual value to the franchise. 

And you know what? If team owner Robert Kraft hadn't finally given in and put Parcells in the Hall as a "contributor," we probably would have put the Tuna on the ballot again. And again, and again, and again.

When the time came to vote, I put three names on my ranked-choice ballot -- Vinatieri, Mankins and wide receiver Wes Welker. I had a feeling I was going to lose that last battle, however. Welker has far better statistics as a slot receiver over his tenure with the Patriots than Edelman, but fans still wrongfully blame him for "dropping" a pass Brady threw that could have made a big difference in the outcome of Super Bowl 46 against the Giants. I and many other media members that were there in Indianapolis have contended for a long time that the ball was thrown behind Welker, and it was almost a miracle that he even got a hand on it.

The folks in charge always say that the votes of the committee are almost always borne out by the results of the popular vote. That's hard for me to confirm because we never see the results of either vote, but I don't mean to suggest any dishonesty on the part of the Patriots' organization. It's probably true, although I have little doubt that when there's a challenge between a player from an earlier era and one from more recent times, the recent player has the advantage.

But I'll also cite one circumstance where I believe the voting was unfairly influenced by events that transpired during the balloting. 

During the 2015-16 offseason, the NFL Draft also coincided with the voting period for the Patriots Hall of Fame. The nominees selected by the committee were Raymond Clayborn, Kevin Faulk and Mike Vrabel. The voting period and draft also coincided with the ongoing battle over "Deflategate," the controversy about whether Brady had illegally reduced the air pressure in the footballs he used in the previous season's playoff game against Indianapolis so he would have more control over throwing the ball.

Brady had already been suspended for four games in the coming 2016 season by NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell, but the veteran quarterback took the league to court trying to get the suspension reversed, and it all was literally the talk of the nation.

Kevin Faulk makes his case for Brady.

So, during the draft, Faulk was invited to announce one of the Patriots' picks during a portion of the proceedings that would receive the full attention of the national viewing audience. As he took the stage, Faulk opened his jacket to reveal a Tom Brady No. 12 jersey, sending a clear message of his support for his QB. Needless to say, the next day, Faulk's recorded vote on the Internet-based Patriots Hall of Fame ballot absolutely skyrocketed -- something that was later and very quietly admitted by those administering the vote.

I don't think I ever voted to put Faulk on the ballot in the first place; he was a good soldier and a very capable third-down back in his later years, when he stopped fumbling the ball in crucial situations, but in retrospect, I believe James White was much better in the role over the full range of his career. In any event, I believe Faulk joined the Hall of Fame fraudulently because of his publicity stunt during the draft.

Edelman's case is different in that I feel he is much more enshrinement-worthy. But I just wish that it could have been put off for a while. Vinatieri will now have no chance to outpoll Rob Gronkowski next year when he gets on the ballot -- in fact, I'm not even sure what the point of a meeting will be, because anyone else we put on the ballot will be sacrificial lambs to the star power of Gronk. 

BB and Jordon Hudson.

And not long after that, Bill Belichick will be on the ballot. Right now, I don't think either Robert or Jonathan Kraft will be willing to consider Belichick as a "contributor" given the contentious nature of their relationship with him in the waning days of his tenure. And no matter what else goes on with Bawdy Bill and his 24-year-old squeeze and personal manager, Jordon Hudson, in the weeks to come, none of that will derail Belichick's entry to the Patriots Hall of Fame. In fact, if social media posts are any indication, Belichick has become even more of a hero among the thirsty incels in Patriot Nation that worship not only his coaching, but now his swordsmanship with the young ladies.

And as is usually the case in situations like this, Vinatieri's chances may wane the farther from his Patriots' career he gets -- unless there's a circumstance like 2017, when Clayborn broke through because he had lesser competition from players from the more modern era. I may not even be around when that time arrives.

If it sounds like I'm bothered by this, you're absolutely correct. I am.

In a way, the Patriots Hall of Fame could be considered an artificially manufactured thing. After all, it's for a team that experienced one-third of its history with actual glory, and about two-thirds of its history in abject futility -- yet there are now 37 members in its shrine, including a former cheerleading coach. Several of its earliest Hall of Fame members wouldn't even get a second look today. And nobody seems to care a lot that players like Michael Haynes and Nick Buoniconti played at least half of their careers elsewhere and were actually better players with their later teams. 

It's already been discussed, and summarily dismissed, that deserving players will be passed over because of logjams in the fan balloting, It's been suggested that some provisions should be made for multiple inductions. But aside from Kraft's own choices, or the selections by a senior committee members' panel that rarely meets to consider players more than 20 years post-retirement, that just isn't going to happen.

So we're stuck with the procedure. The nominating committee may have its flaws, but at least it attempts to give a broad cross-section of those "in the know" a chance to have their say. There are current and former writers and broadcasters on the panel -- although, sadly, much fewer of the older crowd than when the committee was first formed -- as well as former players and coaches and team officials. There are a lot of qualified people in that room, but at the end of the day, we still have to trust our work to the fans that have the motivation to actually vote, and personally, I'm not sure that the cross-section of voting fans is as all-encompassing and knowledgeable as the people that give them the three-name ballot in the first place.

I don't see any of that changing any time soon. 

So we will likely continue to see deserving players slip through the cracks for years to come -- with the only hope for correction coming from the fact that 2018 through the present have produced absolutely no players worth considering in the future. We may need that gap, all the while hoping that Vrabel, Drake Maye and some of the interesting talent that has come on board lately will start to restore the Patriots' fortunes to past levels of excellence.

But I'm not holding my breath waiting. At 71, I can't afford to.

MARK FARINELLA covered the Patriots for The Sun Chronicle, The Patriot Ledger of Quincy and the Associated Press at various times from 1977 through 2019. And he hopes he won't be getting a phone call from the folks at Patriot Place saying he broke too many rules here to stay on the Patriots Hall of Fame Nomination Committee.