Bill Belichick Celebrating His 70th Birthday On Saturday
BOSTON (CBS) -- Saturday is a pretty big day for Bill Belichick. The Patriots head coach is going to have a whole lot of candles to blow out, as Saturday is Belichick's 70th birthday.
Belichick has spent the majority of his life involved in football, thanks to his father -- Stephen Belichick -- and his career at Navy. Bill fell in love with the game at an early age and has been coaching in the NFL since 1975, when he got his start as a special assistant with the Baltimore Colts at the age of 23.
What has followed is one of the most incredible coaching careers in sports history, with Belichick winning six Super Bowl titles as head coach of the Patriots, plus two more from his time as defensive coordinator of the New York Giants. Along the way, he's coached some of the greatest players to ever suit up, from Tom Brady to Lawrence Taylor.
The 2022 season will be Belichick's 23rd in New England, where he's accrued a 290-143 record in the regular season to go with a 30-12 record in the playoffs. He's 31-13 overall as a head coach in the playoffs, with that one other win coming against the Patriots in 1994 when he was head coach of the Cleveland Browns.
Belichick owns the most Super Bowl wins, Super Bowl appearances (9) and most playoff wins by a head coach, but he is not the oldest guy to ever do it. That honor belongs to former Belichick assistant Romeo Crennel, who at 73, was named the interim coach of the Houston Texans in 2020. It broke a 53-year record held by the great George Halas, who was 72 when he retired after the 1967 season.
Belichick isn't even the oldest coach in the NFL, an honor that belongs to Seattle's Pete Carroll, who is seven months older than the guy who replaced him as HC of the NEP. The two made some NFL history when they squared off early in the 2020 season, with their combined age of 137 years and 162 days becoming the oldest head coaching matchup in league history.
While Belichick is now entering his eighth decade, he isn't showing any desire to step away. He heads into the 2022 season 28 wins behind Halas and 38 wins behind Don Shula on the all-time wins list, and probably won't retire until he gets to the stop of the leaderboard.
