Mike Dawson will be added to the UA football's Ring of Honor this month.

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Sometime before the UA's Aug. 30 football opener against Idaho, an Arizona Stadium work crew will quietly erect and put into place a two-word sign that says, simply, MIKE DAWSON.

The placard will take its deserved (and overdue) space next to the most recent Ring of Honor Wildcats: NFL Pro Bowl linebackers Lance Briggs and Antonio Pierce.

Five months after Dawson, a former Tucson High School and UA defensive lineman died of a heart attack, he will become the 32nd Arizona Wildcat so honored.

The best part is that it is neither a sentimental reaction to Dawson's death nor the UA yielding to political pressure. After some sensitive chatter on both sides, it was discovered that Dawson long ago qualified for the Ring of Honor.

Perhaps he was the only one who knew it.

"Every time I pledged to find out why his name wasn't on the stadium wall, Mike would tell me to drop it," his stepson, Matt Randle, said Wednesday. "But after he passed, I knew he couldn't stop me."

The UA initially determined that Dawson, who was 54 when he died, did not meet stated criteria for Ring of Honor inclusion.

The regulations are as follows:

● First team All-American

● Conference Player of the Year

● National Player of the Year, such as the Jim Thorpe Award or Lou Groza Award

● Ten years in the NFL

● Holder of three or more school career records

● Leader of an NCAA statistical category, such as receiver Dave Hibbert in 1958

Dawson had forever been listed as having played nine NFL seasons from 1976 through 1984 with St. Louis, Kansas City and Detroit. Instead, he actually played parts of 11 seasons, but his 1985 stint with the Chiefs — he was on injured reserve until Oct. 14 — and his 1986 tenure with the Lions were essentially forgotten. Dawson was injured in August 1986 and subsequently retired.

Unaware of those final two seasons, UA athletic director Jim Livengood was in a delicate spot. He would not lower the standards to permit Dawson into the Ring of Honor — "it can't be a popularity contest," he said Wednesday — but at the same time worked with the Dawson family to investigate his full NFL career.

It was not until the NFL dispatched pension documents to Bill Dawson, Mike's older brother, that it was proved Dawson is classified as a 10-year NFL veteran.

"The UA has been very gracious to us every step of the way," Randle said. "In the end, the NFL pension papers took care of everything."

Livengood absorbed significant criticism after the Dawson family questioned Mike's exclusion. Arizona's AD has similarly been at the center of a provocative debate whether the school's career rushing leader, Trung Canidate, belongs in the Ring of Honor.

Indeed, of the 31 players whose names are on display at Arizona Stadium — 2007 Jim Thorpe Award winner Antoine Cason will join Dawson this month to grow the list to 33 — Canidate's is the one glaring omission.

He was a third-team All-American whose NFL career was limited to four seasons. Canidate was No. 7 in NCAA rushing as a senior in 1999 and left school as the career rushing leader (3,824 yards) and career leader in 100-yard games (18).

How close can you get?

"I'm not saying it's right to keep Trung out, and I'm not saying he's never going to get in," Livengood said. "We will review our criteria at the next Hall of Fame committee meeting. We need to think it through a bit more. These things aren't set in stone, but neither can you tweak them just to help you on the front end. We consider these honors to be special."

Livengood, who created a similar Ring of Honor at McKale Center for gymnasts, basketball and volleyball players, is right not to compromise standards and thus dilute the UA's athletic traditions.

Perhaps the most sensible way to permit Canidate to join Dawson and Cason is to add a new qualifier: those drafted in the first round by NFL, NBA and WNBA teams would automatically be honored.

Canidate was a first-round selection of the Rams in 2000. If that rule is added, it would also include former linebacker Chris Singleton and pass rusher Anthony Smith. There is not much debate Singleton was a Ring of Honor-type player; but Smith was a one-year UA player, a transfer from Alabama.

And although Smith had a productive NFL career, making the 1993 Pro Bowl, he is a fringe candidate to be remembered in posterity at Arizona Stadium.

But not Dawson. He was a second-team All-America defensive tackle while Arizona played in the WAC and a first-round draft pick of the Cardinals. There is no longer any question about his worthiness.

"We have been invited, as a family, to be at the stadium when Mike's name is put into place," Randle said. "It won't be the same as having him there to see it, but it is going to mean a lot to all of those who knew him and watched him play."