Bill Belichick’s sharp attention to detail and desire for greatness helped produced now-famous phrases like “Patriot Way” and “Do Your Job.”
But before Belichick was lauded for these traits, he was somewhat mocked.
Hall of Fame linebacker Lawrence Taylor, who Belichick coached for 10 seasons during their time together with the New York Giants, candidly admitted Tuesday he didn’t see The Hoodie ascending to the level of legend he has. In fact, Taylor wasn’t very thrilled back in the early 1980s when the Giants promoted Belichick to defensive coordinator.
“I don’t know how it happened, because when I came into the league Bill was assistant special teams coach. Assistant special teams. I mean, the next step after that is water boy,” Taylor said on NFL Network’s “Good Morning Football.” “He got better and better, he put the work in. Year 3 when Parcells became the head coach and they named Bill Belichick as the defensive coordinator, oh I was hot. I went into the office and I said, ‘No way. That’s not gonna happen.’ We used to call him ‘doom,’ because every play, if you don’t do it the perfect way he wants you to do it, it’s the end of the world. It’s the end of the world. So we used to call him ‘doom.’ When he came in as defensive coordinator I was like, ‘We can’t have this.'”
What was @LT_56's nickname for Bill Belichick when he was DC for the @Giants?
The HOFer tells @gmfb⤵️ pic.twitter.com/dkOu7xUYFB
— GMFB (@gmfb) December 10, 2019
Ironically enough, the nickname for Belichick still applied even as he pivoted to his perch in New England. Belichick and Tom Brady routinely have doomed teams’ Super Bowl hopes over the past 20 years and will have a chance to do so again in the coming months. But if Belichick were to rack up another Lombardi Trophy, folks around the football world likely will be calling him the GOAT more so than anything else.
