Professional Football Researchers Association Forum

I would put him 1st.

Evan wrote:Parcells - Had a persona that made you think, holy crap, this guy is a human steamroller. None of his teams had overwhelming talent, especially in the defensive secondary and WRs, but they seemed like they had a sense of every player thinking they had to be the one to turn the game, because there is no one big gun that would do it. Using a 5-7 running back (Morris) as his workhorse seemed like a stupid idea, but boy it worked well. Drove Simms to be better than anyone thought he could be. Kept LT under some sense of control (debatable I suppose) so he could survive the week to detonate on Sundays. Took on teams in an NFC in the 1980s that was just loaded with big, mean, fast athletes all throughout his schedule.

Parcells doesn't have many traits in common with many of the other great head coaches. For one thing, many of the great head coaches were first time head coaches who took over expansion teams or very terrible teams who were so bad they were as bad as expansion teams (1969 Steelers, 1979 49ers). Parcells did this twice, with New England and later with the Jets, and both times he took over terrible teams and immediately turned both teams around and had them either in the Super Bowl or the AFC Championship game within four seasons. Also, most of the great head coaches only coached for one franchise. Parcells could have stayed in New York and coached the Giants for his entire career once he had the two Super Bowl rings, but he always struck me as the kind of guy who liked a new challenge occasionally. Many people forget that as the Executive VP of Football Operations, he was also instrumental in turning around the 2007-2008 Dolphins from 1-15 to 11-5 and Division Champions, which is one of the most amazing one-season accomplishments in pro football history. Every franchise he touched, he left it much better off once he left than it was when he first showed up, and there are few people in the history of football you can say that about. For his ability to immediately turn a team around, time after time, Parcells always reminded me a lot of Billy Martin, the baseball manager of the 1970's and 80's, but without the odious personality of Martin that made you want to get rid of him a year or so after you hired him.

Rupert Patrick wrote:

lastcat3 wrote:So where would you rank Belichick amongst all time great coaches as of early 2019?

He has to rank as one of the greatest, and he didn't play with the advantages that coaches like Noll and Lombardi and Brown had where once they acquired a guy, that guy belonged to them for the rest of the guy's playing career. Chuck Noll never had to worry about replacing guys on a calibre of an LC Greenwood and a Donnie Shell and a Rocky Bleier each off-season due to free agency and the salary cap.

That's true, but all of his opposition plays under the same rules. No one gets to keep their team together. It could be an advantage for a coach with a strong teachable system, he knows what to do, by the time the other teams catch up they are losing players and Belichick always has the advantage every year.

I have never thought as much of Parcells as a coach as some of the other ones we have been talking about in this thread.

Parcells was excellent at handling young teams and building them up but he always found a reason to leave before he had a chance to have very many mediocre seasons after that initial success. So I don't really put him in the same category as the coaches who built their team up and also stayed with that team and kept them on top. And keeping a team at the top can often be even harder than building them up because you constantly have opponents gunning for you.

Could Parcells of done it? Possibly. But he generally left before that question could be answered. If I had to guess it was intentional for him to leave before he had to keep a team at the top

Where DO you all place George Halas in this convo? Is there anyone here who feels he's #1 of all-time?

What's interesting - and depressing to me as a Steeler fan these days - is that among the list of the all-time greats there isn't a single one who you'd call a "players coach". I like to think of them in categories Brown and Walsh are the Innovators, Lombardi and Parcels are the Motivators, Landry and Shula feel more like the disciplinarians. Noll - to my mind - doesn't naturally fit in any of these categories and Belichick is somewhat similar or fits somewhere in-between Innovator and Disciplinarian. Now obviously all these guys have to be more than 0% on each of these scales, but these are what I think of as the longest poles in the tent.

All together I'd probably put Paul Brown #1, Belichick #2 and Lombardi #3, but wow that's hard.

NWebster wrote:What's interesting - and depressing to me as a Steeler fan these days - is that among the list of the all-time greats there isn't a single one who you'd call a "players coach". I like to think of them in categories Brown and Walsh are the Innovators, Lombardi and Parcels are the Motivators, Landry and Shula feel more like the disciplinarians. Noll - to my mind - doesn't naturally fit in any of these categories and Belichick is somewhat similar or fits somewhere in-between Innovator and Disciplinarian. Now obviously all these guys have to be more than 0% on each of these scales, but these are what I think of as the longest poles in the tent.

All together I'd probably put Paul Brown #1, Belichick #2 and Lombardi #3, but wow that's hard.

I would put Brown first, Belichick 2, Landry 3 over Lombardi as Landry was more of an innovator and had a much longer and very successful career. I just can't rate Lombardi that high because (1) his coaching career was short, and (2), there isn't much of a tree of coaches who served under him and spread his gospel and methods all around the NFL like there is with Brown and Walsh and Belichick. Bill Walsh had a short career as a head coach also, and I would have to rate him over Lombardi due to his coaching tree.

Rupert Patrick wrote:I would put Brown first, Belichick 2, Landry 3 over Lombardi as Landry was more of an innovator and had a much longer and very successful career. I just can't rate Lombardi that high because (1) his coaching career was short, and (2), there isn't much of a tree of coaches who served under him and spread his gospel and methods all around the NFL like there is with Brown and Walsh and Belichick. Bill Walsh had a short career as a head coach also, and I would have to rate him over Lombardi due to his coaching tree.

Plus, Lombardi's drafting acumen was never terribly high, with Jack Vainisi's untimely death hurting them beyond the personal loss. This is from the Packers website:

"As a trusted lieutenant, Vainisi was given considerable say in the college draft and had a hand in selecting or signing as a free agent seven players who have been inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame. Under his guidance, the Packers drafted Forrest Gregg, Paul Hornung, Ray Nitschke, Jim Ringo, Bart Starr and Jim Taylor. Plus, they signed Willie Wood as a non-drafted free agent. By most accounts, Vainisi also played an influential role in persuading the Packers’ executive committee to hire Lombardi in 1959 as head coach and general manager."

When ranking the all-time head coaches I wouldn't factor in their coaching trees. If anything a better coaching tree could be indicative of a head coach that found success partly because of his assistant coaches (i.e. Jim Fassel, Mike Ditka, and Jim Lee Howell come to mind). I don't think that's the case with any of the all-time greats, but a lack of a coaching tree like in Lombardi's case shouldn't be factored as a negative.

Rupert Patrick wrote:

NWebster wrote:What's interesting - and depressing to me as a Steeler fan these days - is that among the list of the all-time greats there isn't a single one who you'd call a "players coach". I like to think of them in categories Brown and Walsh are the Innovators, Lombardi and Parcels are the Motivators, Landry and Shula feel more like the disciplinarians. Noll - to my mind - doesn't naturally fit in any of these categories and Belichick is somewhat similar or fits somewhere in-between Innovator and Disciplinarian. Now obviously all these guys have to be more than 0% on each of these scales, but these are what I think of as the longest poles in the tent.

All together I'd probably put Paul Brown #1, Belichick #2 and Lombardi #3, but wow that's hard.

I would put Brown first, Belichick 2, Landry 3 over Lombardi as Landry was more of an innovator and had a much longer and very successful career. I just can't rate Lombardi that high because (1) his coaching career was short, and (2), there isn't much of a tree of coaches who served under him and spread his gospel and methods all around the NFL like there is with Brown and Walsh and Belichick. Bill Walsh had a short career as a head coach also, and I would have to rate him over Lombardi due to his coaching tree.

Coaches are not getting paid to train other coaches. Why would that ever be a factor in evaluating a coach? Let's see, Lombardi beat Landry in the NFL Championship game twice, but Dan Reeves got all of that valuable wisdom from Landry that he could use to beat the Browns in the AFC Championship game twenty years later. So we should treat it as the Cowboys really one at least one of the NFL Championship games with the Packers, maybe even both of them?!?

Lombardi was a personal motivator. Bengtson got along for 9 years because he had an opposite personality. From my understanding, the rest of the assistants were treated like lackeys. It was not helpful to making them future head coaches. But that was not Lombardi's job. His job was to win championships, which he did more than Landry and Shula combined.

Yes, his career was short. I have said that I do not believe he would have won again in Washington even had he lived. But five championships is five championships. Many franchises don't have five championships in their entire existence.