FootyChatter.com

NFL Super Bowl LX Bill Belichick, who won six Super Bowls as the coach of the New England Patriots, was not elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame on his first ballot this year. Adam Bettcher / Getty Images Former New England Patriots head coach Bill Belichick, who won six Super Bowls as a head coach and two more as a defensive coordinator, was not voted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in his first year of eligibility, a league source confirmed to The Athletic. The news was first reported by ESPN’s Seth Wickersham and Don Van Natta. Advertisement Belichick, who is currently the head football coach at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill, left the NFL in 2024 after a 24-year run as the head coach of the Patriots. Belichick, 73, has 333 career wins (including the playoffs) as an NFL head coach. He is behind only legendary Baltimore Colts and Miami Dolphins head coach Don Shula in that category, who compiled 347 wins. Shula, a two-time Super Bowl champion, was inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1997, his first year of eligibility. Belichick needed to receive at least 40 votes from a 50-person panel (80 percent) to gain enshrinement. As a coach, Belichick was grouped with one contributor finalist — who, this year, is Patriots owner Robert Kraft — and three senior finalists (players who have been eligible for more than 20 years): Ken Anderson, Roger Craig and L. C. Greenwood. Among that group of five, each of the 50 selectors was asked to vote for three. The highest vote-getter gains enshrinement, along with up to two others who receive at least 40 votes. If none of the five candidates receives 80 percent of the vote, the finalist with the highest percentage is elected. Belichick was selected from the coaches category this year over Tom Coughlin, Mike Holmgren, Chuck Knox, Buddy Parker, Dan Reeves, Marty Schottenheimer, George Seifert and Mike Shanahan. The full Hall of Fame class will be unveiled on Feb. 5 at the NFL Honors show. Voters’ ballots and voting totals are not made public. The Hall changed its selection process in August 2024 — going into effect with the Class of 2025 — adopting stricter rules for selection and also lowering the waiting period for coaches to become eligible from five years to one. That tweak allowed Belichick, who last coached in 2023, to be eligible sooner. Although Belichick is third behind Shula and George Halas in regular-season wins, his 31 postseason wins are the most by a head coach in NFL history. Kansas City Chiefs coach Andy Reid is second in that category with 28. Belichick’s six Super Bowl victories are the most of any head coach in league history. Advertisement Prior to his time overseeing multiple dynasties as the Patriots’ head coach, Belichick went 36-44 as the head coach of the Cleveland Browns from 1991 to 1995. The Browns made the playoffs once under Belichick, in 1994, when they won a wild-card game but lost in the divisional round to the Pittsburgh Steelers. Belichick’s NFL career was not without controversy. He was the face of the “Spygate” cheating scandal in 2007 that saw the Patriots stripped of a first-round pick and fined $500, 000. Belichick was personally fined $250, 000. Belichick was also in charge when the Patriots were implicated in the “Deflategate” cheating scandal in 2015. The Patriots’ remarkable run from 2001 through 2019 is credited to Belichick and Tom Brady. Which man deserved more credit for the team’s unprecedented success between the head coach and quarterback has been a regular topic of discussion. Belichick’s record with Brady as his starting quarterback, regular season and playoffs, is 249-75, a . 769 winning percentage. Accounting for his Browns tenure and the post-Brady Patriots era, Belichick’s record without Brady as his quarterback was 83-104, a . 449 winning percentage. Despite the scandals and lack of success without Brady, Belichick is widely regarded as not just one of the greatest coaches in NFL history, but in all of sports — a point often made by Brady himself. But Belichick’s Hall of Fame validation will have to wait at least one more year. How could Belichick, seemingly a slam-dunk lock for the Pro Football Hall of Fame, fall short of the 40 votes necessary for enshrinement? Let us count the potential ways: • A few voters could have thought the Spygate/cheating allegations against Belichick were disqualifying; • A few voters could have protested new rules making coaches eligible for consideration after only one year out of the league instead of five; • A few voters could have figured Belichick was going to make it regardless, so they funneled their votes to competing candidates in hopes of boosting them over the 40-vote threshold; • A few voters could have prioritized senior players over coaches and contributors, on the thinking that Belichick will be back in the room next year, while the specific players on the ballot this year — Craig, Greenwood and Anderson — would be less likely to return on future ballots. Whatever the specifics were, this looks like voters repudiated the new voting processes that made the odds lower for any one candidate to advance. — Mike Sando, NFL senior writer and Pro Football Hall of Fame selector