Belichick ran away with the award, garnering 30 of a possible 50 votes. He beat out Tampa Bay's Raheem Morris and Kansas City's Todd Haley, who tied for second with 11.5 votes each, and a handful of others. Belichick joined Chuck Knox (four) and Don Shula (three) as the only coaches to ever win the award three times (2003, 2007).
It was clear through much of the season that Belichick possessed the perfect pulse of his locker room, whether it was the little things like giving his players deserved days off in training camp or in the middle of the season, or much more significant things like keeping the ship intact after trading popular wide receiver Randy Moss.
Belichick made a string of tough decisions that could have caused the operation to go either way, and he seemed to hit on all of them. After defensive coordinator Dean Pees left the team, Belichick became much more involved with the defense — his players continuously said Belichick was their defensive coordinator — leading to the speculation that he was spreading himself too thin.
Aside from that, Belichick parted ways with the players who didn't buy into the message in 2009, cutting linebacker Adalius Thomas and cornerback Shawn Springs in the offseason.
Belichick took his biggest risk after the Patriots' significant Week 4 victory in Miami, though, trading Moss about 24 hours after the Pats' team plane landed in New England. Rather than heading into their bye week with momentum, the players' heads were spinning with confusion, but a post-bye acquisition of Deion Branch and a 10-point comeback victory against the Ravens kept the Patriots moving in the right direction.
From there, they built the league's best record and far surpassed outside expectations heading into the season. On the season's final roster, the Patriots had 20 players who they either drafted or signed as undrafted free agents in the last two seasons, and more than half of the players on the active roster were still playing under their rookie contract.
The Patriots also placed 14 players on season-ending injured reserve, and 10 of them had regular playing time in either 2009 or 2010.
With all of this in mind, Belichick again turned the Patriots into legitimate Super Bowl contenders, and he set them up to remain in that position for several more years.
