Being a head coach in the NFL might seem like a dream come true, but this job is one of the most thankless in sports. For coaches at this level, winning and most importantly winning now is the only way to hold on to your position. Success in the NFL is often attributed to the great players on the team, while failures are almost always linked to the head coach. What history has shown is that a great coach might not get you a Super Bowl win every season, but they can most certainly establish a culture within a franchise that allows a team to compete at a high level for a very long time.
The majority of great coaches need time to turn a poor or mediocre team into a winner, but most teams are not willing to invest in the future and want to win now. Take Tom Landry, for example. He’s widely regarded as one of the best coaches of all time. His start with the Cowboys was awful. He went 0-11-1 in his first season and followed that up with season of 4, 5, 4, 5, and 7 wins before going on to make the playoffs in 17 of the next 19 seasons, including five Super Bowl appearances and two championships. Now, Landry might be an exception in history, but if you look at the majority of coaches to win multiple Super Bowls, most have been given enough time to put the pieces they need in place. Not to sound like a grumpy old man, but most owners in the NFL today lack the foresight to allow this to happen, which is why we see a team like New England dominate an era. Everyone else tries to play catch up, but they want to do it in a single season.
There is a bit of a chicken-and-the-egg effect here (what came first, the wins or the job security?), but looking at the list of the most successful active NFL coaches, you will see guys that have had poor seasons bounce back in a way that it is hard to imagine a first-year coach doing. Sean Payton, now head coach of the Denver Broncos, is a great example from his years in New Orleans. He went just 25-23 before winning his first Super Bowl. This was followed by four solid seasons, then three straight 7-9 seasons. New Orleans then went to the playoffs in consecutive years, losing to Minnesota in the famed “Minneapolis Miracle”, and then losing in the NFC Championship the following season. The point is, sometimes it pays to stick with a coach through some difficult times.
Below you’ll find two tables. The first lists the appearances (only as a head coach) for each of the current coaches in the NFL, including their wins and losses. The second is a list of all of the NFL head coaches in history who have appeared in two or more Super Bowls.
Updated through Super Bowl LX, with each team’s current head coach.
| Coach | Games | Wins | Losses | Current Team |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Andy Reid | 6 | 3 | 3 | Kansas City Chiefs |
| Sean McVay | 2 | 1 | 1 | Los Angeles Rams |
| Nick Sirianni | 2 | 1 | 1 | Philadelphia Eagles |
| Kyle Shanahan | 2 | 0 | 2 | San Francisco 49ers |
| Sean Payton | 1 | 1 | 0 | Denver Broncos |
| John Harbaugh | 1 | 1 | 0 | New York Giants |
| Mike McCarthy | 1 | 1 | 0 | Pittsburgh Steelers |
| Mike Macdonald | 1 | 1 | 0 | Seattle Seahawks |
| Zac Taylor | 1 | 0 | 1 | Cincinnati Bengals |
| Jim Harbaugh | 1 | 0 | 1 | Los Angeles Chargers |
| Mike Vrabel | 1 | 0 | 1 | New England Patriots |
| Dan Quinn | 1 | 0 | 1 | Washington Commanders |
| Mike LaFleur | 0 | 0 | 0 | Arizona Cardinals |
| Kevin Stefanski | 0 | 0 | 0 | Atlanta Falcons |
| Jesse Minter | 0 | 0 | 0 | Baltimore Ravens |
| Joe Brady | 0 | 0 | 0 | Buffalo Bills |
| Dave Canales | 0 | 0 | 0 | Carolina Panthers |
| Ben Johnson | 0 | 0 | 0 | Chicago Bears |
| Todd Monken | 0 | 0 | 0 | Cleveland Browns |
| Brian Schottenheimer | 0 | 0 | 0 | Dallas Cowboys |
| Dan Campbell | 0 | 0 | 0 | Detroit Lions |
| Matt LaFleur | 0 | 0 | 0 | Green Bay Packers |
| DeMeco Ryans | 0 | 0 | 0 | Houston Texans |
| Shane Steichen | 0 | 0 | 0 | Indianapolis Colts |
| Liam Coen | 0 | 0 | 0 | Jacksonville Jaguars |
| Klint Kubiak | 0 | 0 | 0 | Las Vegas Raiders |
| Jeff Hafley | 0 | 0 | 0 | Miami Dolphins |
| Kevin O’Connell | 0 | 0 | 0 | Minnesota Vikings |
| Kellen Moore | 0 | 0 | 0 | New Orleans Saints |
| Aaron Glenn | 0 | 0 | 0 | New York Jets |
| Todd Bowles | 0 | 0 | 0 | Tampa Bay Buccaneers |
| Robert Saleh | 0 | 0 | 0 | Tennessee Titans |
The guys at the top of this list are the most legendary coaches in the NFL. If you have appeared in two or more Super Bowls, you are definitely doing something right. With that being said, it is hard not to be in awe of Bill Belichick’s accomplishments with the New England Patriots.
Let’s put it into perspective. There are currently 32 NFL teams, meaning each team has roughly a 3.1% chance to win the Super Bowl each year. This means that if you coach in the NFL for 19 years (as Belichick did in New England from 2000 through 2018, when he won all six of his titles), your odds of winning at least one Super Bowl are about 45.3%—essentially a coin flip. Not bad. However, the odds of winning six Lombardi Trophies in that span are approximately 0.00167% (or about 1 in 59,800).
Want your mind really blown? Using the same assumptions, the odds of appearing in the Super Bowl 9 times in 19 seasons as a head coach in the NFL is around 0.00000019% (or about 1 in 523 million). These numbers are a little misleading because obviously not every NFL team has an equal chance to win the Super Bowl every year—futures odds prove that.
But let’s say the Patriots are the favorites to win the Super Bowl in each of those 19 seasons. This would typically put them at something like +500 (5 to 1), or a 16.7% chance to win each year. Even under these more favorable conditions, the probability of achieving six Super Bowl victories in 19 years is still just 5.47%—an incredible feat that we are unlikely to see again in the history of the NFL.
Updated through Super Bowl LX.
| Head Coach | Games | Wins | Losses | Team(s) | Super Bowls |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Bill Belichick | 9 | 6 | 3 | New England Patriots | XXXVI, XXXVIII, XXXIX, XLII, XLVI, XLIX, LI, LII, LIII |
| Andy Reid | 6 | 3 | 3 | Philadelphia Eagles, Kansas City Chiefs | XXXIX, LIV, LV, LVII, LVIII, LIX |
| Don Shula | 6 | 2 | 4 | Baltimore Colts, Miami Dolphins | III, VI, VII, VIII, XVII, XIX |
| Tom Landry | 5 | 2 | 3 | Dallas Cowboys | V, VI, X, XII, XIII |
| Chuck Noll | 4 | 4 | 0 | Pittsburgh Steelers | IX, X, XIII, XIV |
| Joe Gibbs | 4 | 3 | 1 | Washington Redskins | XVII, XVIII, XXII, XXVI |
| Bud Grant | 4 | 0 | 4 | Minnesota Vikings | IV, VIII, IX, XI |
| Dan Reeves | 4 | 0 | 4 | Denver Broncos, Atlanta Falcons | XXI, XXII, XXIV, XXXIII |
| Marv Levy | 4 | 0 | 4 | Buffalo Bills | XXV, XXVI, XXVII, XXVIII |
| Bill Walsh | 3 | 3 | 0 | San Francisco 49ers | XVI, XIX, XXIII |
| Bill Parcells | 3 | 2 | 1 | New York Giants, New England Patriots | XXI, XXV, XXXI |
| Mike Holmgren | 3 | 1 | 2 | Green Bay Packers, Seattle Seahawks | XXXI, XXXII, XL |
| George Seifert | 2 | 2 | 0 | San Francisco 49ers | XXIV, XXIX |
| Jimmy Johnson | 2 | 2 | 0 | Dallas Cowboys | XXVII, XXVIII |
| Mike Shanahan | 2 | 2 | 0 | Denver Broncos | XXXII, XXXIII |
| Tom Coughlin | 2 | 2 | 0 | New York Giants | XLII, XLVI |
| Tom Flores | 2 | 2 | 0 | Oakland Raiders, Los Angeles Raiders | XV, XVIII |
| Vince Lombardi | 2 | 2 | 0 | Green Bay Packers | I, II |
| Bill Cowher | 2 | 1 | 1 | Pittsburgh Steelers | XXX, XL |
| Dick Vermeil | 2 | 1 | 1 | Philadelphia Eagles, St. Louis Rams | XV, XXXIV |
| Hank Stram | 2 | 1 | 1 | Kansas City Chiefs | I, IV |
| Mike Tomlin | 2 | 1 | 1 | Pittsburgh Steelers | XLIII, XLV |
| Nick Sirianni | 2 | 1 | 1 | Philadelphia Eagles | LVII, LIX |
| Pete Carroll | 2 | 1 | 1 | Seattle Seahawks | XLVIII, XLIX |
| Sean McVay | 2 | 1 | 1 | Los Angeles Rams | LIII, LVI |
| John Fox | 2 | 0 | 2 | Carolina Panthers, Denver Broncos | XXXVIII, XLVIII |
| Kyle Shanahan | 2 | 0 | 2 | San Francisco 49ers | LIV, LVIII |