Team owner Robert Kraft also failed to receive enough votes to be included in the Class of 2026, according to multiple media outlets. The inductees will be announced Thursday night at the NFL Honors ceremony in San Francisco.
Kraft was among the many people who expressed disbelief last week when the news surfaced that Belichick, who coached the Patriots to six Super Bowl victories and nine appearances in the NFL’s championship game, would not be entering the Hall of Fame in his first year of eligibility.
“Whatever perceptions may exist about any personal differences between Bill and me, I strongly believe Bill Belichick’s record and body of work speak for themselves,” Kraft said in a statement.
“He is the greatest coach of all time,” he added, “and he unequivocally deserves to be a unanimous first-ballot Pro Football Hall of Famer.”
Belichick and Kraft were part of a pool of candidates separate from that of the modern-era players. Belichick was this year’s finalist in the coaches category, while Kraft was the finalist in the contributors category. Three former players — Ken Anderson, Roger Craig and L.C. Greenwood — were selected as finalists in the seniors category.
The 50 members of the Hall’s selection committee were allowed to vote for up to three of those five finalists. A maximum of three of those finalists can make it into the Hall by receiving at least 80% of the votes. If none of them gets 80%, then the person receiving the most votes makes the cut.
Kraft was first nominated for the Hall of Fame in 2013 and was a finalist for the first time this year. He has made it to the Super Bowl 11 times since buying the Patriots in 1994, more than any team owner in NFL history.
While Kraft may not have his name announced as a Hall of Famer this week, he could be getting a pretty decent consolation prize days later — if coach Mike Vrabel, quarterback Drake Maye and the rest of the current Patriots bring home the Lombardi Trophy by beating the Seattle Seahawks in Super Bowl LX.
Demond Wilson, who was best known for playing Lamont Sanford, the son of Redd Foxx’s character on the 1970s TV show “Sanford and Son,” died in his sleep at his home in the Coachella Valley on Jan. 30. He was 79.
Wilson’s publicist, Mark Goldman, confirmed that he died from complications related to cancer.
“Demond was surrounded by love throughout his final days,” Goldman said in a statement. “A devoted father, actor, author, and minister, Demond lived a life rooted in faith, service, and compassion. Through his work on screen, his writing, and his ministry, he sought to uplift others and leave a meaningful impact on the communities he served.”
Demond Wilson attends the 2016 Chiller Theater Expo at the Parsippany Hilton in New Jersey on April 22, 2016.
(Bobby Bank / WireImage)
Grady Demond Wilson was born in Valdosta, Ga., on Oct. 13, 1946, and grew up in New York City. His mother, Laura, was a dietitian, and his father, Grady Wilson, was a tailor. Wilson learned tap dance and ballet and appeared on Broadway at just 4 years old. After serving in the Army from 1966 to 1968 in Vietnam, where he was wounded, he made his TV debut in 1971, playing a burglar alongside Cleavon Little in Norman Lear’s sitcom “All in the Family.” That role led to his casting in “Sanford and Son” in 1972, which was notable at the time for having a nearly all-Black cast.
Redd Foxx, left, broods next to Demond Wilson about one of the 3,000 pieces used on the “pleasantly junky” set of “Sanford and Son.”
(NBC)
Although “Sanford and Son” was his most famous role, Wilson also appeared in “Baby, I’m Back,” “The New Odd Couple” and “Girlfriends.” His last TV appearance was in “Eleanor’s Bench” in 2023.
Despite his success, Wilson left acting, sold his Bel-Air mansion and Rolls-Royce and became an interdenominational preacher in 1983.
The change was not surprising given his background. “I was raised a Catholic, was an altar boy, and at 14 I seriously considered becoming a priest,” Wilson told The Times in 1986. When he was 12, his appendix ruptured and he nearly died, leading him to promise to serve God as an adult. “I was always aware that God was the guiding force in my life,” he said.
Disillusioned with Hollywood, Wilson moved his wife and children to what he jokingly called a “respectable, Republican, upper-middle-class” neighborhood in Mission Viejo. He wanted his five children at the time to have “normal childhoods.” “We’ve left the rat race and false people behind,” he said.
Wilson was also an author. He published “The New Age Millennium: An Exposé of Symbols, Slogans and Hidden Agendas” in 1998, and his autobiography, “Second Banana: The Bittersweet Memoirs of the Sanford & Son Years,” in 2009. He also wrote 11 children’s books.
Wilson is survived by his wife, Cicely; his six children, Nicole, Melissa, Christopher, Demond Jr., Tabitha and Sarah; and his two grandchildren, Madison and Isabella.
Chatting on a video call from a studio in LA, the singer and producer says: “There were moments in my career where I found myself more focused on novelty and gold.
“There are artists who want to be at the Grammys in three years — that’s their focus. They want to be successful and famous within a certain time and organise all of that in their head.
“For me, I was more focused on the music than the fame. I’d be obsessed with a guitar sounding like a Chuck Berry record and I started to question if I was in the right place. Should I be chasing success?
“I thought it was weird that I wasn’t obsessed with awards and accolades, and I questioned if I was in the right industry.”
On his recent single, the hip-hop confessional Implosion, Labrinth says: “I was losing my mind. It was ripping away from my ego.
“When you taste success, it’s an addictive drug, and you don’t know you’re obsessed. It’s chasing dopamine. You don’t know you’re addicted until you try to pull away.
“If you need success to be validated or to be fulfilled, then there’s something wrong. And that’s where the implosion for me was. I needed to evolve beyond these urges and needs. Then I got an ADHD diagnosis and everything made sense.”
That was two years ago, when the artist born Timothy McKenzie finally got an answer that explained his behaviour.
He says: “I was lucky and went to see a doctor in the US.
“It can take months, even years, to get answers. I went to see Dr Amen, who is a celebrity doctor, and he did a scan of my brain.
“He could literally point things out like where I’d hit my head when I was ten. He did a real deep dive into how my brain works. And after that, it allowed me to be a lot more forgiving with myself.”
The idea for Cosmic Opera Act I came from the inner turmoil Labrinth had experienced with his mental health in the entertainment business while trying to define his own success plus his love for films like Star Wars.
“I still haven’t been to an opera — I know that sounds insane,” he says with a laugh.
“The opera is connected to drama and deep emotion.
“Then the cosmic part was after reading an article which said there are as many connections in our brain as there are stars in our universe.
“So that was the perspective of the title — with mental health the subject.
“I’ve always been a fan of opera from a distance, and I’ve always enjoyed the idea of exploring it.
“Also, I grew up with films from the Eighties like Indiana Jones and Star Wars. Those film scores stuck in my mind and I wanted to make an album that incorporated and explored their sound.
“Of course, me working in film and TV pushed me further into that direction.”
I wrote that song to show how I had evolved from the pain and confusion about my dad. I looked at myself as being a mini Luke Skywalker coming out of his demons
Labrinth
Labrinth’s love of Star Wars was also the inspiration behind one of the many standout songs on the album, S.W.M.F. (Star Wars Motherf***er), the singer feeling at peace with his demons.
It was a battle that helped him agree to soundtracking the Christmas John Lewis advert, a remake of 1990 rave classic Where Love Lives with original vocalist Alison Limerick.
“The John Lewis song was the finish line of dealing with demons for me — which was my relationship with my father.
“The John Lewis storyline was about a father and son’s relationship, so me doing the ad was like me saying, ‘Hey, Dad, I get it’.”
He adds: “Our relationship wasn’t great. My dad, who has passed, was violent and not present. He’d had a horrible childhood with an extremely violent stepfather, and that affected the way he was a father to me.
“I saw him occasionally. He was a bit of a ladies’ man, and I don’t think he knew how to be present enough for me as a kid. He didn’t do stuff like taking me to the park or giving me advice.
“Also, he was violent with me, trying to knock me for six when I was very young.
“So I had to face those demons and it made me think about my own anger or frustration. But when I look back, I feel pity for him, because he didn’t have the tools that I have today.
“It was the same with ADHD — I wanted to understand my brain and the way it works, so that I could be the best father I can be to my three young kids. And, in that journey, it made me think of my dad compared to my relationship with my kids and the moments they needed me — because I never had that.
“So I wrote that song to show how I had evolved from the pain and confusion about my dad. I looked at myself as being a mini Luke Skywalker coming out of his demons.”
Labrinth says music was his saviour as a child and he would spend hours making music after being excludedCredit: Jasper Graham
God Spoke is a special gospel-influenced track inspired by Labrinth’s struggles with religion.
He says: “I grew up very religious. My grandad is a reverend and my mum is a devout Christian. She came over for Christmas to be with her grandkids, and we had loads of talks about religion.
I had a really bad temper. I would be kicked out of class all the time and I’d end up in the music room
Labrinth
“I’m spiritual, but I don’t follow a practice. I have all the respect for those who do follow a religion but I see God as unlimited and infinite and in a lot more places than a room or a structure — that’s why, to me, it’s bigger than one religion or one place.
“So God Spoke is like a homage to my grandad. When I was a kid, a lot of people would come to church for redemption. So I wrote that I’m at the end of being the old me, and I’m ready to grow and morph into the new me.”
Burn out
Labrinth says music was his saviour as a child and he would spend hours making music after being excluded.
“I got in a lot of trouble at school,” he says.
“I had a really bad temper. I would be kicked out of class all the time and I’d end up in the music room.
“Eventually it got to the point where I would get in trouble purposely, just so I could go there, because it was the easiest place for me to be, and the most peaceful.”
Labrinth says there is still not enough help with artists and their mental health in the entertainment industry.
He says: “RSD — Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria — is associated with ADHD and there are many artists in the music industry with this.
“Artists don’t learn how to manage their careers or their mental health. When they get a deal, they can burn out because they don’t have the tools to support the way their brain works.
“A lot of artists can end up in drug abuse, because they don’t have the skills to deal with a song not working.
“There isn’t a support system in the music industry — and it’s needed.”
In April Labrinth will take Cosmic Opera Act I to Coachella festival in California.
He says: “I am still working on how that looks, because it’s not cheap to do what is on the record. But I have big ideas and big visions for how I want to present the music and what I want to explore sonically.”
The Hackney-born star last played the festival in 2023 and was the talk of the weekend, with surprise guests Billie Eilish and Zendaya — in her first live show in over seven years, performing I’m Tired and All For Us from Euphoria on the second weekend.
“Zendaya was not planned at all,” says Labrinth. “Billie was the first week but Zendaya, who was on a film set, said she couldn’t make it.
“Then she called me to say she was going to Vegas to watch Usher and would be passing by. So it was literally last minute.”
Labrinth is looking forward to working on the score for Euphoria season three because Oscar-winning composer Hans Zimmer has joined the show’s production team.
Labrinth says there is still not enough help with artists and their mental health in the entertainment industryCredit: Alamy
He says: “The show is special because it speaks to the language of this era. That’s what inspired me.
“And this time, having Hans Zimmer involved — an experienced genius — makes a difference. I’ve always wanted to work with him, so this is my chance to do so.
If I could work with anyone next I’d say David Attenborough
Labrinth
“Gladiator was the film that got me on to Hans, and True Romance is another I love.
“He and Beyonce picked my song [Spirit] for Lion King so then I was like, ‘Well, I need to meet this guy’. It seems like life is trying to pull us together.”
Labrinth has learned a lot from working with superstars.
He says: “Beyonce has been a fan for a long time, because she’s checked out a lot of my records. She’s very kind, and treats people with respect, and is a real professional.
“Abel [The Weeknd] was like an animal in the studio. He knows what he wants and then it goes crazy when he releases something.
“If I could work with anyone next I’d say David Attenborough. I know he’s not a musician, but I love his voice and I’ve always wanted to put him on a record. Morgan Freeman and him — their voices are musical instruments to me.
“But next I’m in London working with Skepta. The UK has some special artists and I’m dying to get over there to perform.”
TWO years ago, Take That’s Howard Donald delivered 52 tapes to Netflix in an enormous Ikea bag.
He had spent the past 35 years quietly filming the band as they transformed from working-class lads into bona fide global stars.
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In one emotionally-charged interview, Gary Barlow talks about his struggle with bulimia, which started following Take That’s split in 1996 and his rivalry with RobbieCredit: NetflixGary says he spent 13 months rarely leaving the house as he struggled with his mental health and weight gainCredit: NetflixThe band had transformed from working-class lads into bona fide global starsCredit: Netflix
“Are you sure it wasn’t a Prada bag?” Howard teases as I interview the group to celebrate the release of a three-part Netflix docuseries based on that footage.
It was a bold move given the much-publicised trials and tribulations of one of Britain’s biggest bands, who have landed 12 No1 singles in their 35-year career.
The series features candid new interviews with current members Gary, 55, Howard, 57, and Mark, 54, alongside never-before-seen footage and photographs.
Robbie, 51, and Jason, 55, allowed archive chats with them to be used to narrate their part in the story.
In one emotionally-charged interview, Gary talks about his struggle with bulimia, which started following Take That’s split in 1996 and his rivalry with Robbie.
Taunts from Robbie are replayed during the documentary, with footage showing him saying: “My problem always was with Gary, I wanted to crush him. “I wanted to crush the memory of the band and I didn’t let go. Even when he was down I didn’t let go.”
Speaking at the premiere of the documentary at Battersea Power Station in South London on Monday night, Gary admits it was tough to watch.
‘Butt of the joke’’
He said: “It’s a narrative that I haven’t thought about for years and years. When we had our reunion we spent a lot of time talking about it and I remember leaving on one particular day and we’d discussed everything. And I remember leaving and my shoulders were light.
“And I’d not thought about it since because I’d not needed to. And it brought it all back. Tricky times they were.”
In the documentary, Gary shares previously unseen photographs of him as he struggled to find his purpose and says: “You’re the butt of the joke. It was so excruciating you just want to crawl into a hole.
“There was a period of 13 months where I didn’t leave the house once. I’d also started to put weight on.
“The more weight I put on the less people would recognise me and I thought, ‘This is good. This is what I have been waiting for. This is a normal life’.
“So I went on this mission then, if the food passed me I would just eat it. And I’d killed the pop star.
“I would have these nights and I would eat and eat and eat but however I felt about myself, I felt ten times worse the day after.”
At his heaviest, Gary, who has three children with his wife Dawn, weighed just over 17 stone.
He explained: “One day I thought, I have been out, it’s 10 o’clock, I have eaten too much, I need to get rid of this food.
It only took a few years to get that low, but it took me years to get back to who I wanted to be. Ten years probably.
Gary Barlow
“You just go off to a dark corner of the house and you make yourself sick. You think it’s only once and all of a sudden you’re walking down that corridor again and again.
“Is this it? Is this what I am going to be doing forever?”
By 2003, Gary turned his life around, and he said: “I just went, ‘No, I’m not having this any more, I’m going to change. I want to change and I’m determined that this is not who I’ve become’.
“It only took a few years to get that low, but it took me years to get back to who I wanted to be. Ten years probably.”
Discussing his recovery with The Sun in 2021, he explained: “I’ve been very strong-minded about how I live and what I eat.
“In general, I work on a 90/10 — 90 per cent sensible-choice food and ten per cent fun choices.
“Buy a nice little writing book, one you’ll feel good about holding and keeping on you at all times. Do a food diary every day, and look down and you’ll see what you’re doing wrong.
“A food diary will also show you what you’re missing in your diet. If you want to get serious and go to a dietician or to a friend and seek help, you can show them the diary.”
Howard is also painfully honest about how hard life was following the end of Take That.
In the documentary, Howard recalls returning home and says: “I felt like I was the only one who didn’t grow up, even though I was the eldest.
“I was a nobody in school, I didn’t go to university, I didn’t think I’d do anything but I felt like a superhero up on that stage.
“It was going towards a depressive state. I decided to go to the Thames.
“I was seriously thinking I was going to kill myself but I was too much of a s**tbag to do it.”
Speaking backstage at the premiere, Howard explains that the band did not want to hide the painful parts of their journey.
He said: “I think it is such a true documentary. You can easily do a documentary and take out all the bits that you feel uncomfortable with — and there are quite a lot of uncomfortable bits in there.
“But it’s true of the last 35 years of Take That. There is a lot of footage people have never seen. It’s good for people to see.”
Gary admits weight gain made him less recognisable – and briefly feel like he had found a ‘normal life’Credit: NetflixNetflix’s Take That is available to stream nowCredit: PA
Mark is also seen struggling to cope with life after the band, who landed their first Top Ten hit with a cover of Tavares’ It Only Takes A Minute in 1992.
He said backstage: “We were working hard, playing all these gigs and things got very hard — but then we got back together. Maybe miss out on the middle bit.”
‘I got a lot of stick’
Like Robbie and Gary, Mark attempted to launch a solo career, but was dropped by his label in 1997, a year after Take That split.
He added: “You start to feel very negative about yourself.”
Robbie and Jason’s clashes with the band’s former manager, Nigel Martin-Smith, are also discussed in the doc.
Robbie says: “Nigel as a manager, he never managed me, he managed Gary Barlow. I wanted him to love me but he never did.”
Jason adds: “When I was in Take That the first time around I was the dancer and I accepted that at the time.
“I don’t know if this is the time or place to say, I was told not to bother singing, ever.”
After the group came back as a four-piece without Robbie in 2005, they ceased working with Nigel and found new representation.
Of the change, Jason says: “Robbie and I got a lot of stick from Nigel. He made us all feel insecure.
“I could feel worthless in the band and I didn’t deserve to feel that. I didn’t want to feel that any more.
“We had chosen our own management, we had chosen our own people, we were in control.”
Director David admits there was some trepidation when it came to showing the three episodes for the first time.
In about 25 minutes we’d put things to bed that had haunted us for years.
Gary on Robbie feud
Speaking backstage alongside producer Gabe Turner, David said: “We talked long and hard about how to do it.
“There is some really hard stuff in there for them, it was a tricky thing for them to watch and it was nervy for us to watch it with them.
“They allowed us to push them to that place. We asked them to lay down their story and they allowed us to take them to that place.”
Gabe added: “Episode two is punchy. With a lot of documentaries you are building that relationship for the first time, you’re working on the fly, but these guys know us and know what we want to do.
“I felt really positive about how little they wanted to see it. They handed us the keys and said, ‘Do you thing’.”
As well as the tough times, Take That fans get a front seat to the inner workings of the group’s comeback with Robbie in 2011.
‘Haunted us for years’
Opening up about healing their old wounds, Robbie says: “I needed Gary to listen to my truth.”
Gary continues: “There were things around people not being supportive of his songwriting and his weight. I’d called him Blobby rather than Robbie one day, which I shouldn’t have done.
“Then I hit him with things he had done to me that I didn’t like
“In about 25 minutes we’d put things to bed that had haunted us for years.”
As well as hearing original demos on the series, fans also get treated to a new single, You’re A Superstar, at the end of the third episode.
The track, taken from their tenth album, is expected to be released later this year.
We’ve got the first steps, we’ve got the Netflix documentary, then we’ve got the Circus tour, then there will be new music.
Gary
Backstage at the screening in London, Howard said the trio have spent months working on the material, adding: “It’s going really well.
“We’ve all been writing separately, writing together and I think we’ve got a really good choice of really good songs.
“We are really proud of them and we just can’t wait for people to hear them.
“We’ve got the first steps, we’ve got the Netflix documentary, then we’ve got the Circus tour, then there will be new music.”
Mark continued: “The tenth album feels quite special. I am really excited about what I am hearing.
“It’s given us a boost, the songs that are coming through and the fact it’s our tenth record, it’s like ‘Go on guys!’.”
Ahead of their 17-date Circus Tour, which kicks off at St Mary’s Stadium in Southampton on May 29, fans will be wondering now if history will repeat itself — and Robbie will rejoin again.
And Gary for one is hopeful, saying yesterday: “At some point it’s going to happen.
“And that’s one of the wonderful things about our band — you never know what’s around the corner.”
Netflix’s Take That is available to stream now.
Gary shows off his buff physique while on holidayCredit: BackGridGary and Take That in 1992Credit: Getty
BRAVE BOYS GO WARTS AND ALL
THESE days, most big stars who promise a warts-and-all documentary about their lives end up pulling a Kim Kardashian and overseeing every last scene.
But not Take That, who were brave enough to hand over hundreds of hours of footage to Netflix to tell their story.
For the most part, the three-parter is the most mesmerising trip down memory lane – with Gary, Howard, Jason, Robbie and Mark starting their career in the band by performing in gay clubs and then school halls in a desperate bid to make it.
But with all the hilariously fun Nineties fashion and moments of shared joy, there is a heavier undertone that echoes around episode one before loudly arriving in the second.
The realities of being shoved into the emotional mincing machine, which was sadly part and parcel of being a pop star in the Nineties, are hard to watch.
My heart hurt as Mark, who penned my favourite Take That song Shine, begged people to ask about his solo music when the band split in 1996 – and when Jason admitted he was told that he was only good enough to dance and “shouldn’t bother singing”.
And I was close to tears as Howard recounted reaching such a desperate point after they split that he considered taking his own life.
I’m lucky enough to work with big musicians regularly and, each time, I am reminded that no matter how famous they are, they are all human.
I’ve watched artists break down backstage under the strain of big tours and have been privy to quiet moments of anxiety and fear over their chart performances.
For Take That to pull back the showbiz curtain to allow the public and fans to see the realities of the highs and lows of fame was a brave move – but, boy, it paid off.
