With win over Bears, Belichick would pass George Halas on all-time wins list
Bill Belichick has lots of nice things to say about the Chicago Bears. He might be the only person who does.
The New England Patriots head coach began his week by opening his first media session with a seven-minute filibuster on the Bears. He went deep down the team's roster. He mentioned such names as Dante Pettis, Trestan Ebner and even kicker Cairo Santos.
Belichick is well-known for saying more about his opponents than his own team during media sessions. This was another classic case. In the course of a 20-minute interview window, Belichick ate up one-third of the time discussing the Bears' "pretty impressive group" before he even opened it up to questions. The man deserves an A-plus for running out the clock and avoiding questions about his quarterback situation regarding Mac Jones and Bailey Zappe.
All of that is to say, there's nobody like Belichick.
He does things his way and he has won six Super Bowls doing it. He has also tied legendary Bears coach George Halas for second on the all-time wins list.
With the Patriots' 38-15 win over the Cleveland Browns last week, Belichick tied Halas with 324 wins as an NFL head coach. As the longtime coach of the Bears, Halas amassed 324 wins as a head coach. Belichick currently has 324 wins, including both the regular season and postseason. He has coached the Patriots since 2000 and had a stint with the Cleveland Browns from 1991-95.
With a win over the Bears on Monday, Belichick would move into sole possession of second place. The only remaining milestone ahead of him would be Don Shula's 347 wins.
Picking up his 325th win against the Bears would be quite symbolic for Belichick. Halas founded the Bears and was instrumental in creating the NFL. He coached his Bears during several stints from 1920-29, 1933-42, 1946-55 and 1958-67. As a head coach, he won six NFL championships with the Bears. His teams won two additional championships when he was just an owner and not a coach.
"You can't win games in this league without good players," Belichick said after Sunday's win. "So I'm very fortunate to have coached a lot of great players and had a lot of great coaches on my staffs through the years. A lot of those guys have gone on to have tremendous careers. And the players, obviously, many of them are Patriots Hall of Fame, NFL Hall of Fame or gonna be. It's really - winning games in this league is about players, and I've been very fortunate to have a lot of them. Had them at New York. Had them at Cleveland. Had them here."
The Bears haven't beat Belichick since December 2000. The Patriots have won five consecutive games against the Bears since then.
As a longtime defensive coach, new Bears head coach Matt Eberflus can respect Belichick's defensive prowess over the years.
"Take away a guy's strength and make him play left-handed," Eberflus said. "That's his whole motto of what he's been able to do. We've seen it in the Super Bowls and seen him in playoff games do it. Even when he was D-coordinator of the Giants, you saw him do it there. It's been a stellar career and he's been able to do that over the long haul."