Who’s the all-time best NFL coach?

By HAYDEN ALEXANDER
Sheridan High School Student

Editor’s note: The Sheridan Student Column is brought to readers by Sheridan High School’s 10th grade honors English class, taught by Tanya Busailah.

I am writing this column about who I think is the greatest NFL coach of all time and why.

But first, I’ll tell you more about me. I am a 16-year-old sophomore in high school, and I have three older brothers and a five-year-old sister. My oldest brother Gabe, who’s 23, is enlisted in the U.S. Army, my older brother Brently, 22, is attending Indiana University majoring in business, and my older brother Caleb, 18, recently got accepted to Indiana University to major in business management.

I like to play various sports such as football, wiffleball, and basketball at the Biddle Park in Sheridan, which needs a remodel of the basketball court by the way. As far as hobbies, I also enjoy playing video games at home on my PS5 or even on my Oculus. Finally, my favorite color is green, my favorite food is chicken, and I get cherry Coke to drink no matter where I go.

Alright, back to the topic.

Being an NFL coach in general is difficult, let alone being one of the best of all time. It takes winning and a long list of accolades. Those accolades can be as simple as career wins, or even their number of Super Bowls, on up to the unique ones such as the number of Hall of Fame players they coached.

I have looked through the statistics and accomplishments of an assortment of coaches and come down to five coaches who are in close contention for the best NFL coach of all time. In my opinion, those coaches are Bill Belichick, Don Shula, Andy Reid, Tom Landry, and Vince Lombardi. Each one of these coaches has a long list of impressive accomplishments, and I list them all to give a visual on the differences and similarities between them. I got these stats from pro-football-reference.com.

As you can see, these coaches are much more similar than they are different. I think it is immediately easy to pick two coaches to drop from being the best coach of all time, and that is Tom Landry and Don Shula, due to a lack of success in the Super Bowl. In my opinion, winning when it matters most is the most important attribute when determining the best coach in this sense, though it can be completely arbitrary.

That leaves us with Bill Belichick, Andy Reid, and Vince Lombardi.

Next off the board for me is Andy Reid, also due to the lack of Super Bowl success. Even though he has the second most postseason wins from any head coach, right behind Bill Belichick, shows me that his teams, oftentimes, seem to fold under the immense pressure of the Super Bowl.

Now between Belichick and Lombardi, I think it is extremely difficult, but I also think having the second most regular season wins of all time, most Super Bowl wins, and most postseason wins of all time is enough to cement him as the best NFL coach of all time, and that is Bill Belichick. Lombardi puts up a good fight, though, with his 5-1 Super Bowl record. If Vince Lombardi didn’t have his coaching career cut short due to a colon cancer diagnosis, he could have won. Going to six Super Bowls in nine years and winning five of them is nothing short of impressive.

To sum everything up, I believe Bill Belichick is the best NFL head coach of all time. What do you think? I leave you with a quote from Bill Belichick: “Talent sets the floor, character sets the ceiling.”