In the off-season of 2000 New England Patriots fortunes changed forever.
The Pats traded for the right to sign Bill Belichick as head coach, and then in the NFL draft with pick 199 they drafted a little-known quarterback out of Michigan named Tom Brady.
Twenty years later and the Patriots have appeared in nine Super Bowls, winning six of them, and boast 19 consecutive winning seasons.
It’s simply known as the Patriots dynasty, and it’s something we might not see in a salary cap-driven sporting league ever again. Almost certainly it won’t be seen in the NFL again.
Tom Brady and Bill Belichick are polar opposites. Brady is a charismatic people quarterback but Belichick is a cold football lover who cares only about winning football games. Brady’s obsession with winning football games and being the best football player he can be is what made this relationship work for so long.
(AP Photo/Steven Senne)
Belichick implemented a few things to live by if you were to join the Patriots: ‘Do your job’ and the ‘Patriots way’. Adherence was expected, and if you didn’t live the Patriots way and do your job, you’d be shown the door faster than you could imagine.
You’d rarely hear anything coming out of the Patriots locker room – no rumours of unhappy players and definitely no players running their mouth to the media or on social media, which is rare in a sport with so many big egos. But taskmaster Bill Belichick made it possible for everyone to be on the same page every year in their quest to win Super Bowls.
In the 2000 season the Patriots went 5-11, but Brady wasn’t the starting quarterback – that position belonged to four-time Pro Bowler Drew Bledsoe, who had actually signed a then record ten-year $103 million contract with the Patriots after the 2000 season. Week 2 of the 2001 season and Bledsoe was injured on a sack, leaving him with internal bleeding. From that point on Tom Brady never relinquished the starting quarterback position until 2020.
Brady officially took over as starting quarterback in Week 3 for the 0-2 Patriots. He went 11-3 in the regular season and went on to win the Super Bowl against the heavily favoured St Louis Rams. The Brady and Belichick reign had begun, but nobody could guess what would come next.
The Patriots lost the first game in 2003 31-0, which was the biggest loss in the Brady-Belichick era, but what followed was possibly the most dominant two-season stretch the NFL has ever seen. New England lost only three more games across between 2003 and 2004, which resulted in back-to-back Super Bowl victories.
After just four years of Brady and Belichick together they had three Super Bowl rings.
The next few years were all solid regular seasons but ended in failed play-off attempts, as underscored by the 2007 season. After going undefeated 16-0 throughout the regular season, with Brady throwing for a then-record 50 touchdowns and winning his first MVP award, thanks to David Tyree’s helmet catch the New York Giants unfortunately managed to hand the Patriots their first loss of the season in the Super Bowl.
The 2008 season started as poorly as you could possibly think. Tom Brady tore his ACL in the first match and missed the season. In a true reflection of how good Bill Belichick is, he led a Patriots team with a backup quarterback to an 11-5 result, but due to a series of tie breakers the 2008 Patriots became the second team in history in miss the play-offs with an 11-5 record. This would be one of only three times Bill Belichick would miss the play-offs as Patriots head coach.
(AP Photo/Charles Krupa)
The dynasty was really cemented between 2011-18. New England made the AFC championship game every single year, winning five of them, and made five Super Bowl trips in eight years. They won three more Super Bowl rings, making it six in total, which means Brady owns the most Super Bowl rings as a player and Belichick the most as a coach, plus of course they have the most Super Bowl wins for a coach-player combination in NFL history.
The culture needs to be spot on for a sporting team to have such sustained success. Belichick has his ways and has stuck to his formula throughout his career. He has plenty of stories about releasing players for not living the Patriots way by not showing up to team meetings on time or missing sessions – it’s something Belichick won’t tolerate.
Belichick led the Patriots way, but the most important display of culture that had been built was from Tom Brady. Despite winning MVP awards and performing at a constantly high level, he regularly took pay cuts throughout his tenure so the Patriots could afford to pay for other stars to help win games of football.
The NFL have consistently seen teams bob up and make a Super Bowl or win a Super Bowl only not to be seen on the big stage any time soon. In recent times we’ve seen Cam Newton win a league MVP and carry the Panthers to a Super Bowl while still on his rookie contract. He then demanded a five-year, $103 million contract, which has left the Panthers missing the play-offs in three of the past four seasons – and they were eliminated in the first round in that one season they did make the post-season.
That’s just one example of a team that has struggled after making a Super Bowl. The Patriots are lucky that Tom Brady has never demanded a huge contract. Even after his MVP season in 2007 he asked for only $8 million a year. It definitely helps that his wife is one of the highest-earning supermodels in the world, but nobody would bat an eyelid if Brady asked for what he probably deserves each year – but that’s not his way. He wants to win, and the best way to win is to have money spent elsewhere for players to protect him and players he can throw to.
A 20-year relationship in any context is impressive, and for Brady and Belichick to be together for 20 years, including 18 full seasons, and to win six Super Bowls is incredible. It’s something we won’t see in the NFL again. The writing has been on the wall about a potential split between the two for a few seasons, but it still doesn’t seem right for it to finally happen. It’s a credit to the professionalism of the two that they were able to compete to the very end – even this year halfway through the season the 10-1 Patriots were Super Bowl favourites.
It sure will take some getting used to seeing Brady in a different jersey, but everything must come to an end. The Patriots dynasty has concluded for now, but don’t write off Bill Belichick just yet.
Frankie321
Roar Rookie
Nice article. Thanks.
Jakeb Migro
Roar Rookie
Fair to say due to the patriots dominance free agents didn’t want to join the other teams in the AFC East - why go to a team when the chances of winning your division is very slim? Definitely helps the disfunction from the Jets, Bills and Dolphins
ojp
Guest
couldnt help myself and looked at some more pics from 2018 / 2019 - Baker Mayfield, Big Ben Rothesligber, Adam Thielen .... all with eye polish.
ojp
Guest
Re the black shoe polish under the eyes; its still 'a thing' in American Football; just checked a preview of the 2019 season and in the photo, 5 QB's, 3 of them are rocking the eye polish (Brady and Brees... so both older guys; but also Carson Wentz.. who is young)
ojp
Guest
Good observations John; especially your last paragraph... the whispers cant be completley ignored and whilst I dont really disagree with Shiek's notion below of pushing the boundaries, filming the other teams sideline was cleary on the wrong side of the fence (and they got caught doing it again this season!) as was deflating the ball.... if it made no difference, why was the equipment guy sneaking into the dunny to let air out of the balls before home games ? Are we really expected to believe that he did that of his own accord.... of course, that guy doesnt work for the Pats anymore, but I reckon he got taken care of financially. Full disclosure; I was a Houston Oilers fan but I could never get on board with the Titans, so faced with choosing a new team, I went with Americas Team, the Buffalo Bills (jokes!) mostly because I figure they will eventually get the better of the Pats and that will be all the sweeter! What cannot be denied however, is that despite 'the whispers' the Pats have been an amazing team for the last 20 years both guys are clearly right at the top of their respecive professions.
Sheikh
Roar Rookie
Some (most?) coaches have a specific system and draft, sign or trade for players that fit their system. Belichick and his coaches did it the other way round; they signed players who were over-looked by other teams and made their system get the best out of the players' talents. This must have created extra work for themselves, effectively evolving their offense and defense every year to work with what they had on the roster, but it also meant that other teams struggled to learn how to stop them - how do you learn how to stop a constantly moving target? Yes, Belichick has the stains of deflategate, spygate, etc on his resume, but if you are going to push the boundaries of what is allowed, you're bound to step over the line on occasion. And what he's done is mainly test the boundaries, rather than things like put bounties on certain players ;) In Brady he found a rare QB - someone with enough of an ego to have a burning desire to win, but yet not require the personal accolades or recompense which you normally find - he seemed genuinely happy for his teammates to get credit.
Kevin
Guest
Can they also thank their fellow members of the AFC east for being so dis functional I’m sure this allowed for some help
John
Guest
Thanks for this. I like what you've written, as well as the comments which have added some context and further details. Here is some more. Bill Belichick grew up in a football family, with his father spending many years as a football scout at the Naval Academy. He was defensive coordinator at the New York Giants in the 1980s and won 2 super bowls in that role, then moved to Cleveland as head coach but was fired with little to no success. So Bill has 8 rings in total. Tom went to the University of Michigan from where he was the 199th pick in the NFL draft. Every team in the NFL had six separate chances to select Tom Brady and chose not to. You've probably seen the infamous picture of him in his shorts when he entered the NFL draft with that unathletic physique of his. Yet when asked which was his favorite ring, Tom was quoted as saying "the next one". Time will show that Belichick was an innovative coach in that he moulded the team's playing style to the players they had. As mentioned in an earlier comment, they played run heavy when they had good backs, and pass heavy when they had good receivers. They were tight-end heavy when they had several good tight ends. The "lean" Patriot years were commonly due to not effectively bringing in enough talent around Brady. One cannot, however, write about the Patriots without also mentioning the whispers. There was the tuck rule, spygate and deflategate. There was Aaron Hernandez, the murderer. More recently, Robert Kraft himself tarnished his own legacy. At least in the U.S. (I live in Connecticut) you either loved them or hated them and more fans hated them to be sure. Was it jealousy? Probably. Was it warranted? Maybe. Did they deserve the success? It lasted a few months short of 20 years. As a life-long one-eyed Eels fan I would say - absolutely.
peter ostle
Guest
Good narrative. The Patriots, though, did not exactly trade for Bill Belichick, it was more that they took Belichick and then due to contractural issues had to trade for him. Further, what is missing from your narrative is how Belichick did not stick to one method of attack and defence. He created teams that were run heavy, that were more pass heavy, or defences that were 3-4, 4-3, or creative in stopping an opposition offence. Moreover, due to being near the bottom of each round in the draft he, and his scouts, looked for players who would fit their system, and in part this may have been seen in how players accepted the team before self. Belichick has certainly created a template on which other coaches from sports that have salary caps, drafts, free agency etc. can refer to as one way to develop a team over time. As to Brady, well this shows how being in the right place at the right time can be beneficial. However, Brady's selflessness [you note this] led to him realising that if he wanted longer term success he needed a team. These two also were part of wider team of players, assistant coaches and scouts, and an owner who all knew their roles, but were all willing learners. As to will there be another duo like them in the NFL, well probably not.
Pickett
Roar Rookie
I also love the black shoe polish on the eyes - to block out the glare :happy: Brady must be the only athlete in the world in over 40 years that still does it. A tribute to a bygone era.
Pickett
Roar Rookie
Thanks - very nice write up. I'm not a Pats fan but think what they've achieved is unbelievable in a salary cap environment. Apparantly Tom Brady spent time playing checkers/board games with his team mates/wide recivers such was his comraderie, not the aloof star QB that some were. Can it be repeated? Neve say never. I'm sure some were saying the Montanna/Walsh partnership would never be emulated.