NittanyFan

November 1st, 2023 at 3:01 AM ^

Great stat: McDaniels is 20-33 as a NFL Head Coach, and pretty clearly isn't good at his job.

BUT: he went 3-0 against Belichick and 3-0 against the Broncos!  He would win when he had the extra incentive!

Joined: 12/04/2012

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bighouseinmate

November 1st, 2023 at 8:48 AM ^

Eh, to be fair, an actual great QB can make any coach look great, but will cover up any team deficiencies that only show up once they are gone. Lafleur in GB is a great example too. Without Rodgers the packers look meh at best but when Rodgers was there they were always dangerous. I choose to look at it not as much of a knock against Belichik, but as more of a testament to just how great Tom Brady was while he was there. 

Joined: 12/19/2008

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befuggled

November 1st, 2023 at 9:41 AM ^

I'd add that Belichick is also clearly in the down side of his career. I don't think he's been making great personnel decisions, and I seriously question the people on his staff. Bill O'Brien is past his time, and Belichick has not one but two of his kids on staff (Brian and Steve).

He also had Matt Patricia calling plays. Matt Patricia. Calling plays. How is that a good idea?

Patricia at least had the good sense to get a job with the Eagles this year.

Joined: 07/01/2008

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Hensons Mobile…

November 1st, 2023 at 9:55 AM ^

The downside of Bill's career coincides with the loss of Brady. Interesting.

From 2011 to 2019, the Bucs had one winning season. 9-7 in 2016. Most of their seasons were 4 to 6 wins.

In 2020, when Brady was the oldest he'd ever been (obviously), the Bucs won the Super Bowl, then lost by 3 points to the eventual SB champs in the divisional round in 2021. In 2022 they were only 8-9 but still made the playoffs somehow. Finally Brady retired. Bucs are currently 3-4.

Despite what Pope Lando said, it is only within the last few years since Brady left New England that people have been even suggesting that Brady might have been the key factor to Belichick's success. Most of the dynasty the predominant feeling was Brady was a system QB and Belichick won with defense and his genius mind and could have been equally good with Rodgers, done more with Peyton, or maybe possibly been limited to only 5 super bowls with Matt Hasselbeck.

Joined: 09/12/2019

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ShadowStorm33

November 1st, 2023 at 9:54 AM ^

I was thinking about this specifically with regards to Bledsoe. Belichick might have won a Super Bowl if Bledsoe stayed the QB instead of Brady taking over--winning in 2001 was definitely a surprise, but the 2003 and 2004 teams were powerhouses--but on the other hand, it's a lot easier to put together elite talent when your QB is on his rookie contract (as a 6th round pick no less) than it is when your QB is the highest paid player in the NFL (Bledsoe had signed the largest contract in NFL history prior to the 2001 season). So it's no guarantee that the Patriots would have been as good if they didn't have the extra cap space that cutting Bledsoe provided them...

Joined: 07/22/2008

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ShadowStorm33

November 1st, 2023 at 10:04 AM ^

He's better than average. He put together some amazing defenses as DC for the Giants and as HC for the Patriots. And he gets at least some credit for Brady--he drafted him, kept him as the starter even after Bledsoe (the highest paid player in NFL history at the time) came back from injury, and fostered an environment that allowed Brady and his teammates to thrive. But without Brady it's clear that he isn't the greatest coach of all time, as most had assumed. He is (or at least was--quite possible he's over the hill now) a good to great coach that benefited immensely from having the greatest QB of all time play for him for nearly 20 years...

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trueblueintexas

November 1st, 2023 at 11:01 AM ^

There are very few good NFL head coaches who's accomplishments didn't coincide with an exceptional QB. 

Bill Walsh had Montana & Young

Chuck Knoll had Bradshaw

Jimmy Johnson had Aikman

Mike Tomlin had Roethlisberger

Andy Reid had Donovan McNabb and now Mahomes

Mike Holmgren had Brett Favre

Sean Payton had Drew Brees

Bill Parcells had Phil Simms

Trying to argue who made who is useless. It takes both. 

And if anyone brings up Brian Billick and Trent Dilfer, Ray Lewis is going to come after you. 

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LeCheezus

November 1st, 2023 at 5:07 PM ^

Gibbs is a bad example and you know it.  That's barely modern football, especially on the passing side of the ball.  That's like me saying Joe Montana is an average QB because of his numbers pale in comparison to the top 10 QB's starting in 2023.  

The point stands that almost all successful long run NFL coaches had long runs with good quarterbacks.  The ones that didn't had teams that were exceptional at something else.  

ESPN did a very interesting article a year or two back breaking Brady's career into 3 distinct eras.  The first, which I think had the first 3 super bowl wins, were very much defensively led teams and were certainly not carried by Brady.  The whole "Tom Brady wasn't Tom Brady at Michigan" can be extended to "Tom Brady wasn't Tom Brady until ~2006."

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Hensons Mobile…

November 1st, 2023 at 10:58 PM ^

I will hear no such blasphemy of Joe Gibbs.

I responded to a post that mentioned Bill Parcels, Bill Walsh, and Chuck Knoll. I think bringing up Joe Gibbs was pretty in-bounds.

And to your point that "almost all successful long run NFL coaches had long runs with good quarterbacks" is exactly why I mention Gibbs.

So yes, other than the excellent example of Gibbs that I provided, and Parcells as I also noted above, very few (if any) other great coaches had such sustained success without a HOF QB. So using that as criteria would eliminate almost all coaches from being above average coaches, which is statistically impossible.

SO FINE!

Bill Belichick is an above average coach who deserves credit for having drafted, kept, helped develop, and started Brady.

But in reality, he held Brady back, refusing to give him weapons on offense, with the exception of 2007 when he got to play with Randy Moss and had 50 TDs. The only other two seasons where he even reached 40 TDs were in Tampa Bay.

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GLORY

November 1st, 2023 at 6:14 AM ^

Brady always made everyone around him better.  Now in his absence, teams/coaches/players are realizing his true value.  There's no doubt Belichick is a great coach, but It's safe to say there's no longer a much debate on who had more influence in the Patriots dynasty.

Joined: 06/12/2021

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LeCheezus

November 1st, 2023 at 5:11 PM ^

Tom Brady wasn't an elite level passer until several years into his NFL career.  The early Patriots SB's with Brady and Belichick were very much defensive teams.  Not Ravens winning the SB with Trent Dilfer level, but the early SB's were not won by TOM MF'ING BRADY like the later years.

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Blau

November 1st, 2023 at 9:57 AM ^

The more I think about what makes HC successful is less about X's and O's or schemes and more about the culture of a team starting from the coaching staff.

The Lions are a good example here with two recent coaching stints. Matt Patricia was being heralded as the next coaching wunderkind in New England and was the top candidate across the board for NFL teams looking for a HC. It was pretty clear that by the time he was let go, that he had lost the respect of his team and the ownership no matter how good he thought he was at scheming the opposition. 

Enter Dan Campbell, who many proclaimed as a meathead, rah-rah type of guy without the coaching acumen of his peers and the results speak for themselves. Having Ben Johnson helps and Aaron Glenn seems to have righted the ship on defense but give me a coach that all 53 players want to play for every down, every game, and you should find success. He did a recent sit down interview before the last MNF game and was close to tears talking about his first year in Detroit going 3-13 and how the team never quit and he truly loved coaching that specific team regardless of their record. That's a far cry from anything McDaniels has done.

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