Most NFL coaches would look back on a Super Bowl victory is the highlight of their coaching career, but that’s not how legendary head coach Bill Belichick views his first Super Bowl victory with the New England Patriots.
During an interview with The 33rd Team this week, Bill Belichick revealed that he didn’t think his team was “one of the better teams in the league” until his fourth season with the Patriots, even though New England won the Super Bowl in his second season with the team.
“When the opportunity came in 2000, even though this team was nowhere near the team that we left in ’96, it had declined quite a bit, there were still a few pillars here that we could build with,” Belichick told The 33rd Team. “And I’d say by ’03 — even though we won in ’01 — by ’03 this was a pretty good football team in all three phases of the game. It kind of took the same basic four-year window that it took in Cleveland. Again, we were fortunate to win in ’01, but I’d say by ’03, ’04, we had one of the better teams in the league.”
It’s certainly a wild opinion, and the NFL world had plenty to say about it on social media as a result.
Is this the coach that had lost 2 1st rd picks, a 3rd, a 4th, and acquired the largest fine ever given to a coach for cheating and circumventing nfl rules?
— Sgt. Salt (@Thee_EliNeal) June 23, 2023
https://twitter.com/DoctorWds/status/1672258027611725833?s=20
https://twitter.com/Iamobjective12/status/1672205458503786500?s=20
Belichick isn’t necessarily wrong as the Patriots did not become truly dominant until a couple of years later, but it’s still interesting to hear that a coach won a Super Bowl with a team he does not consider one of his better teams.
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