Tim Tuttle, SI.com

NASCAR's Hall of Fame will begin the process of selecting its inaugural five inductees Thursday when 25 nominees are unveiled. It will be prestigious to make the list, virtually a guarantee of future membership, and it will be interesting to see who doesn't make the cut -- those forgotten by the passage of time.

It's vital that the 21-member nominating committee honor those who built what is now the Sprint Cup Series from its first season in 1949. If the Red Byrons and Herb Thomases aren't there now, they'll probably need to form an Old Timer's Committee to make sure deserving people make the Hall. Maybe Byron and Thomas will never make it, but they deserve to be nominated. In the absence of criteria being produced for nomination, the committee shouldn't consider active drivers. There's plenty of years ahead to install Jeff Gordon and Jimmie Johnson. It would leave more room for those from the formative years, those who did the heavy lifting.