This could be the end of the line for Bill Belichick in New England.
Nothing lasts forever in the NFL, but Belichick’s run with the Patriots is as close to everlasting as it gets. It has been unprecedented and legendary by any standard, let alone during the rampant parity of the salary-cap era. We will never again see anything like the Belichick-Tom Brady tandem, with a ridiculous nine Super Bowl appearances, six rings, 17 AFC East titles and, somehow, 13 AFC championship game appearances in 19 years, including eight in a row from 2011-2018.
But as we all know, Brady was more than ready to depart after a playoff loss to Tennessee at the end of the 2019 season, and owner Robert Kraft – mediating a long-simmering cold war between arguably the greatest player in the history of the NFL and arguably its greatest coach – signed off on life without Brady.