Mazz: Steve Spagnuolo > Bill Belichick
Simple question: Steve Spagnuolo or Bill Belichick?
For me, it’s Spags.
Now, if that feels like grave-trampling, hear me out. For starters, let’s give the more specific criteria: one game, next week, for all the marbles. You get to pick your defensive coordinator to go against the best quarterback in football. At this stage, it would be hard to pick anyone other than Spagnuolo, the Whitinsville, MA native who now has four Super Bowl titles as a defensive coordinator, including three with the Kansas City Chiefs.
A product of Patrick Mahomes’ greatness, you say? Not so fast.
Lest anyone forget, Mahomes and the Chiefs were beaten by Tom Brady and the Patriots in the 2018 AFC Championship Game, in overtime, 37-31. That was Mahomes’ first full year as a starter. It was also the year before Spagnuolo arrived as defensive coordinator, a move the Chiefs made because they quickly identified that even Patrick Mahomes could not overcome a defense with sizable holes in its hull.
GLENDALE, ARIZONA – FEBRUARY 12: Defensive coordinator Steve Spagnuolo of the Kansas City Chiefs looks on during the second quarter against the Philadelphia Eagles in Super Bowl LVII at State Farm Stadium on February 12, 2023 in Glendale, Arizona. (Photo by Christian Petersen/Getty Images)
In the five years since Spagnuolo showed up, the Chiefs have now gone to four Super Bowls and won three of them, including the last two. This season, Kansas City ranked No. 2 in the NFL in scoring defense and just completed one of the great defensive runs in NFL postseason history, holding some of top-ranked offenses in the league based on scoring – No. 2 (Miami), No. 6 (Buffalo), No. 4 (Baltimore) and No. 3 (San Francisco) – to an average of under 16 points per game. During the regular season, those same clubs averaged an aggregate of better than 28 points per game, which means the KC defense was good for about two touchdowns per game.
Oh, and then there’s this: Spagnuolo now has four titles as a defensive coordinator, the most in history. Belichick had two.
Before anyone suggests a recency bias, here’s the trump card: outside of his three titles with the Kansas City defense, Spagnuolo’s other championship came at the end of the 2007 season, when he devised the New York Giants’ game plan in defeating the then-unbeaten Patriots (18-0) in perhaps the greatest Super Bowl upset of all-time. Of course, Belichick’s Patriots pulled off a similar feat against the St. Louis Rams in 2001, but the counterpoint is obvious. Spagnuolo has an answer for every Belichick achievement on the defensive side of the ball. He also has more of them.
Now, if we’re talking about the resume as a head coach, that’s different.
Belichick, of course, wins in a landslide.
