CHARLOTTE, N.C. — This year marked the second consecutive time that Greg Biffle was on the NASCAR Hall of Fame ballot and the first since the December plane crash that killed him and six others while making an emergency landing at a regional North Carolina airport.What Biffle accomplished on the track during his nearly 20-year career makes him a deserving candidate, and it’s understandable why some thought Biffle would be the second of two Modern Era enshrinees, along with 60-time Cup Series winner Kevin Harvick. Instead, Jeff Burton, who has maintained an important presence in the sport long after his driving career, got the nod in a class that also features Pioneer Era driver Larry Phillips and longtime NASCAR executive Lesa France Kennedy, who won the Landmark Award given to an individual for outstanding contributions to NASCAR.Burton is fully deserving, but Biffle’s Cup Series resume is similar, and he has the most wins across all three of NASCAR’s national series among Hall-eligible drivers who have not yet been inducted.Biffle has also done notable work away from the track, where he was renowned for his humanitarian efforts. In 2024, after Hurricane Helene ravaged western North Carolina, he made numerous helicopter flights to provide aid to those impacted. That may not relate to NASCAR specifically, but a driver using his platform in such a way is a positive for the sport by any measure.Alas, Biffle did not make the cut Tuesday. In fact, he was fifth in the Modern Era category, behind (in order) Harvick, Burton, driver Neil Bonnett and Hendrick Motorsports engine builder Randy Dorton.“Greg Biffle was a teammate (at Roush Racing), and we had a lot of good times together, and he won a lot of races and O’Reilly (Series) and Truck (Series) championships,” Burton said. “He definitely, definitely deserves to be in the Hall of Fame at some point. When that is, that’s not for me to decide.”Biffle will likely be inducted someday, but that he’s not already in with a clearly worthy resume is a shame, particularly now that he’ll never get to celebrate it.Voting process needs to be examinedThe 15 finalists for the NASCAR Hall of Fame are divided into two categories: 10 in the Modern Era category, with the top two vote getters selected; and five in the Pioneer Era, with the lone top vote getter selected.An unfortunate byproduct of this process is that, in many years, deserving individuals like Biffle repeatedly fall short of the threshold to earn enshrinement due to the limitations on inductees.Established in 2010, NASCAR has limited its class sizes each year to maintain some measure of exclusivity in each induction and to prevent running out of truly worthy candidates too quickly. Unlike other major sports with hundreds of active players, coaches and other potential nominees every year, NASCAR has a much smaller pool.That’s a reasonable concern in theory, but these limitations are starting to feel cumbersome, effectively creating a logjam of nominees with bona fides to be in the Hall of Fame. But they are still waiting for the nod because of an artificial restriction.Take this year’s Pioneer Era nominees, for example: All five should’ve been inducted long ago. Ray Fox, Harry Hyde, Banjo Matthews or Herb Nab — all legends from the sport’s early days — are still waiting.It’s an indictment that those five don’t already have a plaque hanging inside the NASCAR Hall of Fame. And the process can mean some deserving candidates — like Biffle and Fox, who died in 2014 — never get to have their moment.Instead of having a cap with an arbitrary number of open slots, the NASCAR Hall of Fame should alleviate the backlog by changing its election process.The most straightforward way is to set a voting threshold for induction rather than limit the class size. For instance, Major League Baseball’s Hall of Fame rules state that a nominee must appear on 75 percent of the ballots to be voted in. There are no limits on the total number of inductees who can be elected in a single year, and voters can have up to 10 names on their respective ballots.If NASCAR used a similar formula, where voters could choose more than just two candidates from the Modern Era and one from the Pioneer Era, there would be less pitting of worthy nominees versus each other. If a voter felt compelled to vote for Kevin Harvick and Jeff Burton and Greg Biffle, they could. And if enough voters agreed, then they’d all go in.The dam to get into the Hall of Fame is clogged, with no signs that it will open up anytime in the near future. It’s long overdue for a change.That said, Harvick was a no-doubterIf there was ever a NASCAR Hall of Fame nominee who should be considered a shoo-in, no discussion needed, just vote “yes,” it would be Harvick, whose name was on the ballot this year for the first time.Harvick’s induction in his first year of eligibility was a foregone conclusion thanks to a stellar resume that puts him in deserved conversation as one of NASCAR’s all-time greats, touting not only a Cup Series championship but also wins in all four of the sport’s crown jewel races — the Daytona 500, Coca-Cola 600, Brickyard 400 and Southern 500. His 60 career wins rank 10th all time.Everyone knew Harvick would be one of the names announced Tuesday. Still, he wished to maintain a low profile before the news was made official. So he sat in a pickup truck parked outside the NASCAR Hall of Fame, waiting until he heard his name called by NASCAR CEO Steve O’Donnell.Since ending his Hall of Fame driving career, Kevin Harvick has stayed around the sport, joining the Fox broadcast booth. (James Gilbert / Getty Images)“It felt so arrogant to come sit in the room,” Harvick said. “I’ve never been somebody who wants to pat myself on the back — I want to be respectful. I don’t want anybody to think that you take it for granted, no matter what you think the scenario is on the voting process or where you stand. I felt like it was almost disrespectful to come sit in the room.”In addition to what Harvick accomplished as a driver, he also enjoyed considerable success as a team owner. Kevin Harvick Inc. won several championships and races in NASCAR’s two other national series. But what he did extended beyond being a prolific winner on the biggest stages.Picked as the successor to seven-time Cup champion Dale Earnhardt, who died in a crash on the last lap of the 2001 Daytona 500, Harvick scored an emotional win in just his third-career start.That win, in many ways, epitomized the defining characteristics that came to define Harvick’s now Hall of Fame career, combining elite talent with an ability to rise in big moments.“When you look at the grand scheme of everything, right, you look at the whole Hall of Fame piece of it, and you talk about your reputation and you talk about the respect, I think that speaks volumes of the things that you were able to accomplish,” said Harvick, who will be inducted along with the other honorees on Jan. 22. “And I can say it now, I’m proud of that.”