No debate: Belichick without coaching peer

Pats coach reigns over NFL, with rules designed to stop it.

Bill Belichick is the greatest coach currently working, currently breathing, to have ever breathed.

Five rings and two other Super Bowl appearances in 16 seasons, four more semifinal games in that span, double-digit regular-season vic- tory totals in all but one of the past 17 years and a win- ning record in every one of those years.

In a league defined by parity, where the next-closest franchise has not won more

than two titles (Pittsburgh with two coaches), been to more than three Super Bowls (Pittsburgh and Seattle with two coaches apiece) or had more than 12 seasons with double-digit victories (Colts with three coaches, Packers with two) since the start of the 2001 season.

Oh, and by greatest coach, I mean in any sport.

You don’t do what Beli- chick has done. No matter who your quarterback is.

We’re talking about this here now because Belichick’s New England Patriots won 13 games this year and were the

No.1 seed in the AFC playoffs and because Nick Saban just won another national title. And because my favorite sports media personality asked a stupid question. A poll on the Rich Eisen Show website Tuesday asked, “Who’s the best current coach in all sports?”

At the time of this writ- ing, Belichick had 50.5 percent of the vote. San Anto

nio Spurs coach Gregg Popo- vich, who has five rings since 1999, received 25.5 percent.

Saban, who Monday won his sixth national title as a college coach, his fifth with

Alabama after one with LSU, was third at 18.2 percent. As someone who works in an industry where the strug- gle to drum up content is constant, I can appreciate the introduction of a debate. But there is none here. Beli- chick is the best coach. If what you measure a coach by is wins and champion- ships, the polls close before they open. In a world where saying never is pretty much never a responsible course, what Belichick has done in the salary-cap era in the NFL, where parity/mediocrity is practi- cally part of the constitution, will never be done again. In a league where about half the 12-team playoff field is new every season, the Patriots under Belichick have made the postseason 15 of the past 17 years. Go ahead and go back in NFL history to George Halas or Don Shula or Vince Lombardi or Bill Walsh. Make sure to count the rings while remembering the salary cap came into being in 1994.