TSW has "jumped the shark"

[Orton's Arm]

With the exception of maybe Don Beebe, Cornelius Bennett and Will Wolford, nobody from those teams went anywhere else and had a good career.  In fact, most disappeared after they left the Levy coached Bills...conincidence?

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I consider it a credit to Polian for building a team with continuity. The Bills' best players, for the most part, spent their whole careers here. That's a big reason why the team had as much success as it did.

 

As for the discussion about Levy as a coach, it's fairly obvious that a team's win/loss record has more to do with the players than the quality of the coach. Barry Switzer's Super Bowl ring is a case in point.

 

So you look at the things the coach can control. The most obvious is the coaching staff the head coach assembles. Levy's successes at the coordinator positions include Wade Philips and Ted Machibroda. His mediocre to bad results there include everyone else. So it's a mixed bag.

 

Then you look at motivation. Surely, the comeback victory against the Oilers ranks as one of the greatest feats in football history. But if you're giving Levy credit for that, you also have to give him the blame for the despondent mood that set in on the Bills' sideline in the second half of the #2 Dallas game. The Bills had a first half lead, and for a while it looked like they might win. But it seemed the team responded to adversity by giving up.

 

One factor you usually see with Hall of Fame coaches is a coaching tree. Belichick is a good example. He groomed Crennel, who's now coaching in Cleveland, and he groomed Charlie Weis, who's now at Notre Dame. Levy doesn't really have that kind of coaching tree. Not that his Hall of Fame status should have hinged upon this point, but it's something to consider.

 

As far as X's and Os go, it was clear the Bills were outcoached by the Giants in that Super Bowl. I don't think anyone on either side of the discussion is saying Levy was an elite X's and O's guy.

 

Levy in a nutshell:

- Selection of coordinators: two successes, the rest mediocre.

- Motivation: more successes than failures, but the 2nd half of that Dallas Super Bowl was pretty bad.

- Coaching tree: poor results, though this category isn't as important.

- X's and O's: about standard for an NFL coach.

 

So why is Levy in the Hall of Fame? Maybe for some of the selectors, Levy's induction was a way to honor the Bills of the early '90s. No other team has made it to more than two consecutive Super Bowls, so the early '90s team should be considered a success. While the Bills' success may not always have been due to Levy's brilliant coaching, he was the guy standing on the sideline while these results were achieved.

[apuszczalowski]

A team doesn't win games by themselves

 

A team needs a good coach to be successful and a coach needs a good team to be successful.