Bill Belichick, snubbed from Pro Football Hall of Fame last year, among 5 coach nominees advancing in candidacy for 2027 class

The Pro Football Hall of Fame voting process came under fire and was thrust under a microscope last winter when Bill Belichick, arguably the greatest coach in NFL history, was denied first-ballot status .

Almost a year later, the Hall is moving forward in its annual consideration of potential new inductees. Belichick is once again up for enshrinement.

He's among five former NFL head coaches — the others being Tom Coughlin, Mike Holmgren, Dan Reeves and Mike Shanahan — who have advanced in their candidacy to be elected into the 2027 class, the Hall announced Thursday .

Members from the coach subcommittee whittled down a list that originally included 14 nominees. Next, the subcommittee will thoroughly review the five remaining coaches in contention on Nov. 17, when it meets virtually to pick one of them to present to the full selection committee.

Belichick, Coughlin, Holmgren, Reeves and Shanahan all reached this stage of the selection process last year. Ultimately, Belichick — best known for leading the New England Patriots to six Super Bowl victories during his dynastic run as the franchise's head coach — was picked as the candidate from that category to be up for election.

Keep in mind, of a class' 15 finalists presented at the selection committee's annual meeting, only one coach and one "contributor" are included. The other 13 nominees are modern-era players.

A coach hasn't been enshrined into the Hall since former Cardinals and Chargers frontman Don Coryell went in posthumously as part of the 2023 class.

To be enshrined, a candidate must receive at least 80% approval from the member selection committee. Previously, that usually meant a candidate needed 40 votes. Since, however, the board of selectors has shrunk to 28, and just 25 of them will actually vote .

Even though Belichick was the subcommittee's pick to be in the running for induction last year, he still had to meet that 80% threshold while competing with a contributor — ironically, Patriots owner Robert Kraft — and three "seniors" — Kenny Anderson, Roger Craig and L.C. Greenwood — in a separate part of the ballot. A minimum of one person and a maximum of three from those combined categories could be elected, per then-existing Hall bylaws.

Through all of that complicated mess, Belichick fell short of the necessary votes , leading to ubiquitous outrage, with countless people vouching for Belichick, including his longtime quarterback, Tom Brady, and even Kraft .

Craig wound up emerging from the group of nominees that featured Belichick last year . The iconic San Francisco 49ers running back eventually gave a touching pre-recorded speech upon his induction, during which he divulged that he has vascular dementia.

Back in September, significant changes were announced to the Hall's selection process. One of those was the elimination of the "seniors" category (every player will now be considered in the same pool).

Another was the reduction of the selection committee, effectively from 50 to 25 members (there are three alternates in the current system).

Under the Hall's latest bylaws, an induction class can consist of between three and seven honorees. It still takes 80% approval for enshrinement.

Also notable, the Hall decided its selection committee will return to discussing and submitting their final votes in person . That dialogue, in conjunction with the final voting process, had been held virtually since the COVID-19 pandemic, as reported by The Associated Press .

In early 2027, the selection committee will cast ballots to determine who earns spots in the upcoming class.

On Wednesday, the Hall announced that Kraft is one of the five contributors who have advanced in their candidacy to be elected into the 2027 class.

The class will be announced at "NFL Honors" in Los Angeles in February ahead of Super Bowl LXI, then enshrined in August in Canton, Ohio.