Bill Belichick no longer coaches the New England Patriots.
And unless an unexpected vacancy opens up soon, he won’t be in the AFC East in the fall of 2024.
A few years ago, that would be cause for rejoicing in Western New York. Now, it might be closer to a shrug.
Belichick and owner Robert Kraft announced Thursday that the coach and franchise “mutually agreed to part ways.” Before reading a prepared statement, Belichick joked it was the most cameras he’d seen since the Pats signed Tim Tebow.
New England is just five years removed from its last Super Bowl: a Belichick defensive masterpiece, beating the Rams 13-3.
Of course, a year after that playoff run came an early exit to the Titans in Tom Brady’s last game as a Patriot. Since Brady’s exit, it wasn’t so easy for Belichick, though he did go 7-9 with late-period Cam Newton and then 10-7 with a rookie Mac Jones. But since a 47-17 playoff dismantling in Orchard Park — the “perfect game,” as Bills fans call it, scoring touchdowns on seven straight drives — New England has missed the playoffs twice, including Belichick’s career-worst record 4-13 this season.
Of Belichick’s 302 career wins, more than 12% came at Buffalo’s expense (37-13), though they’ve been harder to come by lately.
In his first 20 seasons in New England, 19 of them with Brady as a starter, Belichick only lost to Buffalo five times. Their rarity makes them more memorable, like the 31-0 season opener in 2003, or the 34-31 thriller in 2021, the only two losses in games Brady started and finished.
Over the last four years, Brady’s exit to Tampa Bay (and now retirement) coincided with Josh Allen’s emergence in Buffalo and Belichick won just two of his last nine games against the Bills.
In those four years it’s become popular to give Brady all (or most) of the credit for that incredible Patriots run, as a way of discrediting Belichick. It didn’t help that Brady won a Super Bowl in his first year in Tampa. But you can’t assume Brady, a sixth round pick who had middling success at Michigan, would have become the virtually unanimous ‘GOAT’ quarterback with just any coach. Let’s not forget what a great defense Belichick put together to slow down the “Greatest Show on Turf” Rams in 2002, nearly two decades before doing the same to Sean McVay’s Rams.
I thought back to Sean McDermott’s handshake with Belichick after the Bills’ 27-21 win over New England on New Year’s Eve. It was longer than most of those midfield signs of respect you see after each NFL game.
“They’ve controlled this division for a long time,” McDermott said. “He’s won X-amount of Super Bowls, so I have a ton of respect for Coach in that regard. His guys, they fought today. That was a tough game, we knew it was going to be a tough game. So it was a cordial, professional handshake and exchange of words and respect.”
Now, with the Bills sweeping the Dolphins last Sunday to claim a fourth straight AFC East title, there’s no doubt who controls the division these days. Time will tell if McDermott and Allen’s partnership lasts nearly as long as Brady and Belichick’s, or generates a ring like the half-dozen New England has.
Belichick’s defenses have long caused heartbreak or frustration for Bills fans, all the way back to Super Bowl XXV with the Giants, essentially conceding the run to slow down the “K-Gun.” But fans here officially no longer have to worry about him, or Brady, in the division.
