NFL Opinion – Belichik Coaching Tree Disaster

You can hate him if you’re from Boston. You can hate him if you’re from anywhere else. No matter what, you have to respect the coaching genius of the hoody-toting coach of the New England Patriots. Bill Belichik has earned a place as one of the greatest coaches the NFL has ever seen.

This is a coach who has a 138-86 SU record in the regular season, and has gone 15-4 SU in the playoffs. Add to that three Superbowl Championships with the Patriots and four AFC Championships and you have a coach who is undeniably one of the best in the game today. Even without Tom Brady, Belichik was able to tear up the NFL last year with Matt Cassell in perhaps his best year as an NFL coach.

So why do all of his assistants go on to be so damn miserable?

Belichik is part of the Bill Parcells coaching tree (read: a coaching tree shows the path of NFL head/assistant coaches as they transpire though the NFL). Parcells’ legacy is well archived, but what about Belichik’s? He’s had six assistant coaches move on to become head coaches elsewhere. Let’s see how they’ve done.

Romeo Crennel – Cleveland Browns (2005-2008)

Crennel may have looked like a member of the dog pound physically, but the Browns fans found themselves pounding their heads in to the bleachers every time they had to put up with the Browns. Crennel went 14-24 SU as a head coach in Cleveland, despite having the talented combination of Winslow/Edwards.

Charlie Weis – Notre Dame (2005-present)

You can’t talk about Crennel and not mention Weis’s failures in the Mecca of college football. Weis has burned down Notre Dame football faster than was deemed possible. He replaced Tryone Willingham, who was beloved by Notre Dame and its fans. He’s accepted millions of dollars, and has since burned the program to the ground like he was preparing for a family picnic.

The team Weis inherited from Willingham went 9-2 SU in his first season, then lost to the Buckeyes in the 2006 Fiesta Bowl, and then got blown out in 2006 by the LSU tiger in the Sugar Bowl by a score of 41-14.

When Brady Quinn bolted, and Weis’s recruiting class began to emerge in the fold, the Fighting Irish did even worse. They went 3-9 SU in 2007 and 6-6 in 2008 losing major games, including one to Navy in 2007. Thankfully for Weis, he’s managed to suck up to the boosters at ND enough to keep his job. But only time will tell if Weis’s recruiting prowess will continue to bury Notre Dame in obscurity.

Al Groh – New York Jets (2000)

The Jets players openly hated Groh’s approach to coaching. He was overbearing, a control freak and militaristic. These are all qualities people have faulted Belichik with, but it works for him. Groh’s Jets finished 9-7 SU and out of the playoffs, and he later left to go hide in the ranks of college football after just one year as a head coach in the NFL.

Eric Mangini – New York Jets (2006-2008), Cleveland Browns (2009)

The “Man Genius” is anything but. He took a loss to the Patriots so badly that he ratted out Belichik’s use of cameras to film “Spygate”. Mangini went 10-6 SU in his first season, then fell to 4-12 in 2007 before acquiring Brett Favre in 2008, going 9-7 and missing the playoffs for a second straight season. In the post season, Mangini has one loss…to New England. Now he’s stuck as the replacement for fellow former-Belicikian, Romeo Crennel.

Josh McDaniels – Denver Broncos (2009)

Everyone in the NFL has been actively pursuing Josh McDaniels for years. He is, after all, the creative offensive mind that helped craft Matt Cassel and Tom Brady in to quarterback weapons. But when McDaniel’s landed in Denver as a head coach, he almost immediately became a cancer to one of the most stable franchises in the NFL. He practically chased star quarterback Jay Cutler out the door, after lying to his face three times and attempting to reconcile over text messaging like a teenage girl. Lord knows how well the Broncos will do this year, but the 2009 betting season isn’t exactly hopeful with McDaniels at the helm.

For all the success that Belichik has bred in New England, his successors can’t seem to recreate the formula. I was raised to believe that the only true legacy you leave behind are your successors – those that choose to succeed your position as a coach/boss/mentor and your children. While I’m certainly not attacking Bill’s abilities as a father, he has failed to nurture any true coaching success in the NFL.

McDaniels is the latest bust in a long line of coaching failures. It’s only a matter of time before NFL owners and bettors back off from supporting the coaching spawns of the great Bill Belichik. How that affects his legacy down the road is a trial that only time can properly judge. So far, it’s not going well.