Patient Ownership in the NFL: A Thing of the Past

In today’s world of hire-and-fire pro football, it’s rare to see a head coach suffer more than a few sub-.500 seasons without being fired. We often have to wonder what that coach might have become or achieved with that team if the owners had shown a little more patience. Depending on team personnel, some teams may be more than two or three years away from turning their fortunes around what ownership allows for a coach.

Two examples of this situation are:

Bill Belichick is considered a genius for his accomplishments with the New England Patriots. He is often credited by respected soccer people as the best and smartest manager in the league. Few mention that there was a time when Belichick was the head coach of the Cleveland Browns and he wasn’t as successful. What if the Browns ownership of the times had shown more patience? Would they have three Super Bowl rings?

Tom Landry coached the Dallas Cowboys for 29 years beginning in 1960, the team’s inaugural year in the league. The Cowboys’ record during their freshman year was 0-11-1, and for the next five seasons they didn’t win more than 5 games a year. Despite this undesirable start, Cowboys ownership gave Landry a ten-year extension in 1965 and he went on to turn (with the help of General Manager Tex Schramm, Roger Staubach, Tony Dorsett and more) the Cowboys into the “America’s Team”, appearing in half of the Super Bowls of the 1970s and winning two Lombardi trophies. One team showed patience and was well rewarded, the other lacked faith in their head coach and fired the man some call the smartest coach in the game. There’s no telling what might have happened if the opposite decisions had been made, but it sure is fun to wonder.