It will be the New England Patriots, coached by a former head coach of the Browns in Bill Belichick, against the Philadelphia Eagles, coached by a former Browns backup quarterback in Doug Pederson, in Super Bowl LII in two weeks.
Wow!
Double-wow!!
It was on Nov. 12, 2000 at what was then known as Cleveland Browns Stadium, when the Browns, with Pederson under center after he was pressed into duty following a slew of injuries to the team’s quarterbacks, ended a seven-game losing streak with a 19-11 victory over the Patriots, with Belichick under fire in his first season as their coach.
The Pats were headed toward a 5-11 finish, which would be their worst record since 1993, when they were also 5-11 under somebody named Bill Parcells, who was in his first season in New England.
Whereas Parcells was being celebrated in New England because those five wins were three more than the Pats had the previous year under former Browns assistant coach Dick MacPherson, Belichick was starting to get skewered. Parcells was being given time to build the Pats. He had earned that favor after winning two Super Bowls in five seasons as head coach of the New York Giants from 1986-90.
But Belichick, who was Parcells’ mastermind defensive coordinator on those Giants teams, was getting no slack from Pats fans because he had failed in five seasons from the Browns from 1991-95, going 37-45. The fans in New England were afraid the Pats were going to end up like the Browns did. After all, the Pats had been 8-8 the previous season under Pete Carroll, so they were going to have three less wins.
Pederson did nothing much to help the Browns that day. It was more that he and the team simply weren’t quite as bad as the Pats.
Nobody – absolutely nobody – on that day nearly two decades ago ever envisioned in their wildest dreams what is happening now, with Belichick viewed as arguably the best head coach in the game’s history, and Pederson viewed as arguably the best “new” coach in the league, matching wits on the sport’s biggest stage.
But as I sat and watched Sunday’s conference championship games, that’s what I was thinking of, as hard as it was to fathom.
