I am a die hard Cowboys fan since I was 3.
37 years.
I became a die hard fan of the San Antonio Spurs when I was 13.
27 years.
I'm going to give a reference towards the Spurs because... well it will make sense in a bit.
I watched a lot of coaches come and go with that team since 1988. From Larry Brown to a guy who specialized in rehabbing addicts and troubled people when he was hired to Tark the Shark to an actual competent coach in Bob Hill who had the team running at a pretty high level, but you just knew wasn't superior and it was proven time after time when his team would hit the playoffs. He had a good team with good talent, but if things got tough, he couldn't overcome. Whether it be from injury, or top competition, etc... he couldn't get his team to win when maybe they shouldn't have won.
Gregg Popovich had just become the team's President and if I recall, the GM and he fired Bob Hill. He saw it too. Hill didn't have what it takes. Even though this coach was coming off a successful 55 win season, you could still see the failure in his work.
In an act of pure hubris, he took over the team and was blessed to get a player named Tim Duncan on his team and the rest is history, but here's my point:
This coach is good. I mean the best, good. He had to learn and evolve, like all other coaches and was gifted with some generational talent, but he has also become a generational coach.
This coach voluntarily rests his (old) best players constantly. Against any type of competition, depending on the stress of the schedule and the stress of the season on his players.
He'll go into a game with a team he self-decimates against overmatched opponents and he will still win.
Now the real point, lol:
Belichick is pretty much in Popovich's class insofar as the NFL. That surly, cheating coach can find a way to beat an opponent he shouldn't.
I'm not saying chalk in the L. I'm not saying that at all. But I'm not going to be putting any respectable money on this game unless they put the odds too insane to pass up.
