WaPo: "Bill Belichick is unchanged, at the peak of his dynasty and at its end"

[ctpatsfan77]

This is an article by Sally Jenkins for The Washington Post.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2023/11/05/bill-belichick-criticism-losing-genius/?utm_source=reddit.com

The theme of all these critiques is that Belichick’s demanding nature no longer works in the modern NFL and that maybe he never really was that good.

This is unjust nonsense. If it’s time to unpack Belichick’s legacy, then it’s also time to observe that the quality Belichick is blamed for now, his unwillingness to compromise and refusal to go with “the theme of the week,” as he once said, is the same one that made him for two decades, right up until 2021, a dynastic overlord whose only historical rivals are Don Shula and George Halas. Whose teams from 2000 through 2019 won a higher percentage of games than any other American franchise and who has racked up a career 31-13 record in the playoffs, along with six Super Bowls. That guy was not a hidden bum, covered up for by great quarterbacking.

 

[ctpatsfan77]

If you can't get through the paywall, I will simply say that the Patriots subreddit might be able to help you with it.

 

[Nikolai]

It's not too hard to figure out that Brady and BB needed each other to achieve the heights they did.

Whatever the issues, it's not working anymore. It happens. Everyone has their time, and then time takes over. It's undefeated. Pour one out for the GOATs.

 

[StrawHatPatriot]

The real answer is Belichick is a great defensive coach, smart guy, football mind, but a lot of what he does as a pure Head Coach and GM just sadly wouldn't have - and has not - materialized into a long-term successful team without Tom.

There were locker room issues in Ckeveland, the first year here in New England, and again now post-Brady.

He went without an Offensive coordinator in his first couple of Cleveland years, and he tried to experiment at offensive coordinator here in 2022 with Matty P.

He alienated Kosar, and now he's alienated Mac.

This isn't even getting into his GMing.

It's not difficult. Bill has some great traits, and built some great defenses for sure. He had some great draft picks. Of course its a team game, of course coaching matters. But his flaws mentioned avove would have cost him earlier without Tom. The Patriot Way isn't- and was never going to be - sustainable without Tom Brady as captain. It's that simple.

 

[VrabelJr]

There were locker room issues in Ckeveland, the first year here in New England, and again now post-Brady.

Source?

 

[PATS16N0]

Once again, I don’t understand how anyone can say a Brady that was 1 for 2 with Bruce Arians, with as many NFC Chanpionships as Aaron Rodgers one year into his NFC stint, “needed” Belichick.

Isn’t Sally Jenkins the one that went to bat for us during Deflate-Hate?

 

[StrawHatPatriot]

Source?

This full article breaks down some of it from 1993, below the link I pasted an excerpt

https://vault.si.com/vault/1993/11/22/the-last-straw-the-browns-cold-fish-coach-bill-belichick-is-unpopular-in-cleveland-where-he-did-the-unthinkable-he-cut-bernie-kosar

This is the excerpt:
"
Several recently departed Browns—Brian Brennan, Paul Farren, Webster Slaughter—have blasted their former boss for being an automaton who offers no positive motivation and sees players only as faceless cogs. Last summer defensive tackle Michael Dean Perry finally had enough and briefly boycotted Belichick's practices. Then, last month, receiver Michael Jackson upped the ante by fairly eviscerating Belichick during a meeting of the Ashland County Browns Backers, who are to the Cleveland brass what the UAW is to the Democratic Party. "If you question Bill, you're out of line." Jackson reportedly said. "He can't relate to the players." Tight end Scott Galbraith, cut earlier this season by Belichick and picked up last week by the Cowboys, calls Belichick's coaching "bully-ball" and draws comparisons to Napoleon.
"

 

[Pape]

So basically he's been a hard ass his whole career...

Leopards can't change their stripes and all that...

 

[amfootball]

Once again, I don’t understand how anyone can say a Brady that was 1 for 2 with Bruce Arians, with as many NFC Chanpionships as Aaron Rodgers one year into his NFC stint, “needed” Belichick.

Isn’t Sally Jenkins the one that went to bat for us during Deflate-Hate?

I agree. I normally love Jenkins articles and opinions but she misses this one by a mile. She clearly didn't do her homework on Bill's entire career pre-Brady and post-Brady or really do a deep dive into the dynasty and how Brady was the one ingraining the Patriot Way culture.

 

[RobertWeathers]

The real answer is Belichick is a great defensive coach, smart guy, football mind, but a lot of what he does as a pure Head Coach and GM just sadly wouldn't have - and has not - materialized into a long-term successful team.

There were locker room issues in Ckeveland, the first year here in New England, and again now post-Brady.

He went without an Offensive coordinator in his first couple of Cleveland years, and he tried to experiment at offensive coordinator here in 2022 with Matty P.

He alienated Kosar, and now he's alienated Mac.

This isn't even getting into his GMing.

It's not difficult. Bill has some great traits, and built some great defenses for sure. He had some great draft picks. Of course its a team game, of course coaching matters. But his flaws mentioned avove would have cost him earlier without Tom. The Patriot Way isn't- and was never going to be - sustainable without Tom Brady as captain. It's that simple.

Innacurate on every level

 

[RobertWeathers]

I agree. I normally love Jenkins articles and opinions but she misses this one by a mile. She clearly didn't do her homework on Bill's entire career pre-Brady and post-Brady or really do a deep dive into the dynasty and how Brady was the one ingraining the Patriot Way culture.

The article was perfectly accurate.

I suggest you research exactly what happened in CLE

 

[RobertWeathers]

So basically he's been a hard ass his whole career...

Leopards can't change their stripes and all that...

So?

Bill has changed...he's no longer what he was

 

[sb1]

Father Time always wins. Even when we’re talking about coaches.

 

[amfootball]

The article was perfectly accurate.

I suggest you research exactly what happened in CLE

I have.

 

[h0c2000]

MSN

Should be outside paywall.

 

[RobertWeathers]

I have.

Not enough or without a balanced view.

 

[Thelonious]

I wish we were still the sort of nation in which a Belichickean approach would still work, but we are not. It is a struggle to make the approach work with "today's athlete," who is more interested in his own individual "brand" and legacy than in falling in line or tackling with self-sacrifice his responsibilities. It is not surprising that the position known most for rabid narcissism - wide receivers - are the group Bill struggles most to evaluate and work with. He'd prefer even a mediocre, reliable, typically older, all to often physically shot player over the sort of athletically elite narcissistic blowhard too often found at that position, the sort of blowhard, alas, who can win you games now that playing defense has been outlawed. At a lower level, the same critique is applicable to many players at other positions. These are the sort of people who will pay a company to deliver food to their door rather than busting out the ol' fry pan, people who pay a service to pick out their clothes for them and drop them off on the stoop each week, people who pay professional PR hacks to craft what they say, who are paid millions to play a game even as they reserve the right to whine about how exploited and unappreciated they are. Bill's approach is rooted in the military context in which he grew up, in the now-defunct puritan work ethic, an ethos we have grown to weak, too effete to embrace.

I want Bill to go, even as I wish the cultural surroundings were such that he could stay.

We will now have to endure endless stories about how the players are "feeling" about it all. I wish we could simply say to them, "Shut the **** up and do your job," but even if that were to work for a time, would all the whining really be worth it , and could it be effective beyond the next imagined slight or disappointment or inconvenience? Obviously not. I have a feeling the NFL may at some point be as unwatchable, the players as unrootable, the game as degraded, as with the dreary charade that is the punked-out NBA.

 

[FCB02062]

people should go find Kevin Mannix articles from the Herald back when Krafty hired Belichick. Mannix accurately described Belichick as "duplicitous pond scum" based on Kevin's sources in Cleveland and their experiences with Belichick.
Belichick would have been fired by the end of 2002 had **** Rehbein not found Tom Brady.

 

[Pape]

So?

Bill has changed...he's no longer what he was

Maybe you misinterpreted my post... Maybe you didn't and I misunderstood yours... Let me try to be clearer

You knew what you had in 2000... Same guy you have in 2023... Same guy who kept this franchise humming for 20 years.

Fundamentally BB has not changed the way he coaches... this should not be a surprise to anyone.

Guy is rock solid as far as I am concerned. If he is here next year, I'm good with that. Make a few tweaks in the scoutíng program/player eval, bring Josh back ànd lets roll .

That's my "so?"

 

[amfootball]

Maybe you misinterpreted my post... Maybe you didn't and I misunderstood yours... Let me try to be clearer

You knew what you had in 2000... Same guy you have in 2023... Same guy who kept this franchise humming for 20 years.

Fundamentally BB has not changed the way he coaches... this should not be a surprise to anyone.

Guy is rock solid as far as I am concerned. If he is here next year, I'm good with that. Make a few tweaks in the scoutíng program/player eval, bring Josh back ànd lets roll .

That's my "so?"

You are fine with him being GM going forward?