The Belichick Number

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TipRoast

TipRoast

The years teach much which the days never know.
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What is the Belichick Number?

It’s a concept I heard about this week in a seminar at work. I’ll explain it here, but first we have to discuss a couple of other topics: physics and cycling.

Arthur Eddington was an early 20th century physicist who came up with the concept of the Eddington number: the number of protons in the observable universe. That number, NEdd, is estimated to be about 10^80.

But that isn’t the only Eddington Number. Eddington was also an avid cyclist, and there’s an Eddington Number for cycling. The Eddington Number for cycling is determined by the number of rides one has made of a certain distance in miles. For example, if you have accomplished 10 rides of at least 10 miles, then your Eddington Number is 10. To get an Eddington Number of 20, you’d have to do 20 rides of 20 or more miles.

At the time of his death, Eddington’s Eddington Number was 84.

————

So what is the Belichick Number?

The Belichick Number is determined by the number of regular season games that resulted in wins. For example, if a coach has 8 seasons in which his team won 8 or more games, then his Belichick Number is 8.

Bill Belichick himself has a Belichick Number of 11: he has 11 seasons where his team won 11 or more games. The only other coach with a number that high is Don Shula.

For Belichick to raise his number to 12, he’ll need three more seasons of 12 wins or more. So you can see that it’s not a trivial thing to achieve a high Belichick Number.

————

After the seminar, it occurred to me that the same approach could also be used for losing seasons. I have decided to call this number the Fisher Number.

For Jeff Fisher, the Fisher Number is 8. To get to nine, he’ll need two more seasons of 9 losses or more. When you think about it, it’s remarkable to have a high Fisher Number - most coaches don’t get the opportunity to continue to rack up that many losing seasons.

Other coaches with a Fisher Number of 8 are Sam Wyche and Norv Turner.
 
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TipRoast said:
What is the Belichick Number?

It’s a concept I heard about this week in a seminar at work. I’ll explain it here, but first we have to discuss a couple of other topics: physics and cycling.

Arthur Eddington was an early 20th century physicist who came up with the concept of the Eddington number: the number of protons in the observable universe. That number, N<sub>Edd</sub> is estimated to be about 10<sup>80</sup>.

But that isn’t the only Eddington Number. Eddington was also an avid cyclist, and there’s an Eddington Number for cycling. The Eddington Number for cycling is determined by the number of rides one has made of a certain distance in miles. For example, if you have accomplished 10 rides of at least 10 miles, then your Eddington Number is 10. To get an Eddington Number of 20, you’d have to do 20 rides of 20 or more miles.

At the time of his death, Eddington’s Eddington Number was 84.

————

So what is the Belichick Number?

The Belichick Number is determined by the number of regular seasons that resulted in wins. For example, if a coach has 8 seasons in which his team won 8 or more games, then his Belichick Number is 8.

Bill Belichick himself has a Belichick Number of 11: he has 11 seaons where his team won 11 or more games. The only other coach with a number that high is Don Shula.

For Belichick to raise his number to 12, he’ll need three more seasons of 12 wins or more. So you can see that it’s not a trivial thing to achieve a high Belichick Number.

————

After the seminar, it occurred to me that the same approach could also be used for losing seasons. I have decided to call this number the Fisher Number.

For Jeff Fisher, the Fisher Number is 8. To get to nine, he’ll need two more seasons of 9 losses or more. When you think about it, it’s remarkable to have a high Fisher Number - most coaches don’t get the opportunity to continue to rack up that many losing seasons.

Other coaches with a Fisher Number of 8 are Sam Wyche and Norv Turner.
Click to expand...

I love it.

Cheers, BostonTim
 
The Rams just announced that the contract of Jeff Fisher will be extended.

Unless there's a dramatic turn around in the fortunes of the Rams, it looks quite likely that the Fisher Number will be set at 9 this year.

The good news for Rams fans is that Jeff Fisher himself would have a hard time raising the Fisher Number to 10. He has four seasons with 10 or more losses. Even if he picks up 10 losses this year, he would still be only halfway there.
 
So if I have this correct, Professor Roast, Fisher's Belichick number is 8, and Belichick's Fisher number is 6 (the Cleveland years brought him down).
 
TipRoast said:
What is the Belichick Number?

It’s a concept I heard about this week in a seminar at work. I’ll explain it here, but first we have to discuss a couple of other topics: physics and cycling.

Arthur Eddington was an early 20th century physicist who came up with the concept of the Eddington number: the number of protons in the observable universe. That number, N<sub>Edd</sub>, is estimated to be about 10<sup>80</sup>.

But that isn’t the only Eddington Number. Eddington was also an avid cyclist, and there’s an Eddington Number for cycling. The Eddington Number for cycling is determined by the number of rides one has made of a certain distance in miles. For example, if you have accomplished 10 rides of at least 10 miles, then your Eddington Number is 10. To get an Eddington Number of 20, you’d have to do 20 rides of 20 or more miles.

At the time of his death, Eddington’s Eddington Number was 84.

————

So what is the Belichick Number?

The Belichick Number is determined by the number of regular season games that resulted in wins. For example, if a coach has 8 seasons in which his team won 8 or more games, then his Belichick Number is 8.

Bill Belichick himself has a Belichick Number of 11: he has 11 seasons where his team won 11 or more games. The only other coach with a number that high is Don Shula.

For Belichick to raise his number to 12, he’ll need three more seasons of 12 wins or more. So you can see that it’s not a trivial thing to achieve a high Belichick Number.

————

After the seminar, it occurred to me that the same approach could also be used for losing seasons. I have decided to call this number the Fisher Number.

For Jeff Fisher, the Fisher Number is 8. To get to nine, he’ll need two more seasons of 9 losses or more. When you think about it, it’s remarkable to have a high Fisher Number - most coaches don’t get the opportunity to continue to rack up that many losing seasons.

Other coaches with a Fisher Number of 8 are Sam Wyche and Norv Turner.
Click to expand...

Interesting read. I completely missed this a year and a half ago.
 
I think I mentioned in another thread about the OP's concept. BB won 12 games last year and will likely win 12 this year. Hopefully he ups his Belichick Number to 12 next year.
 
Jeff Fisher was fired today (2016-12-12), but not before he set a new standard of futility.

Nine seasons in which the team he coached lost 9 or more games.

I find it extremely gratifying that the owner of the franchise with whom he set the record wasted little time in recognizing this achievement. One day after the record was set, BOOM, Jeff was gone.

I don't think we'll ever see the Fisher Number raised (but it could happen if the league starts playing 24 games schedules).
 
bishbash said:
So if I have this correct, Professor Roast, Fisher's Belichick number is 8, and Belichick's Fisher number is 6 (the Cleveland years brought him down).
Click to expand...

I need some clarification on this.
Would Belichick need to have 3 more seasons of 6 wins or less to achieve a Fisher Number of 6?

What is BB's current Fisher Number?

Nevermind- Bishbash is correct. I got confused attributing losses rather than wins to Belichick, as this is a pretty foreign concept ;)
 
Can you subtract one number from the other to get a new quotient, a Belichick over Fisher number?

and what would the largest differential be.
 
benhamean said:
I need some clarification on this.
Would Belichick need to have 3 more seasons of 6 wins or less to achieve a Fisher Number of 6?

What is BB's current Fisher Number?
Click to expand...

Sorry, bishbash, didn't notice your original post. I'll try to address that previous post and benhamean's post here.

Here's a complete answer for each coach (BN is Belichick Number, FN is Fisher Number).

Code: 
Belichick: BN=11  FN=6
Fisher:    BN=8   FN=9

Belichick currently has more than 6 seasons with 6 or more losses (most of those with the Browns, of course). But he doesn't have 7 seasons with 7 or more losses. He would need one more season with 7 or more losses to raise his Fisher Number to 7.

If Belichick get to 12 wins this year, then he will have 11 seasons with 12 or more victories, just one 12-win season away from being the only coach with a BN of 12.

Edit: Just noticed that Tom Coughlin has a Fisher Number of eight. I didn't realize he had so many years with bad records on his resume.
 
TipRoast said:
Sorry, bishbash, didn't notice your original post. I'll try to address that previous post and benhamean's post here.

Here's a complete answer for each coach (BN is Belichick Number, FN is Fisher Number).

Code: 
Belichick: BN=11  FN=6
Fisher:    BN=8   FN=9

Belichick currently has more than 6 seasons with 6 or more losses (most of those with the Browns, of course). But he doesn't have 7 seasons with 7 or more losses. He would need one more season with 7 or more losses to raise his Fisher Number to 7.

If Belichick get to 12 wins this year, then he will have 11 seasons with 12 or more victories, just one 12-win season away from being the only coach with a BN of 12.
Click to expand...

Thanks!
 
With today's win, Bill Belichick has raised his Belichick number to 12.

I doubt he knows about it, or even would care about it if someone were to tell him.

But it's still a notable achievement, to my way of thinking.

Congratulations to BB and all the players and coaches and other people associated with the team that were part of it.
 
Tom-Brady.jpg
 
Since we are talking about this in another thread, BB needs 6 more 13-win seasons to raise his Belichick number to 13, whereas 2 more 8-loss seasons will raise his Fisher number to 8.
 
After thinking about this, I doubt either number changes unless he coaches to 75+. I'll look up the 3 aforementioned coaches tomorrow to see what their Belichick number is.
 
Now that the number of regular season games has gone up to 17, and will likely go to 18 before too many more years pass, the basis for computing the Belichick and Fisher numbers has changed, and achieving a BN of 12 will perhaps become commonplace.

But for those who were around for the glory of those 12 seasons of 12+ wins, set during the era of 16 game seasons... it will never be repeated, and it always will be remembered.
 
TipRoast said:
Now that the number of regular season games has gone up to 17, and will likely go to 18 before too many more years pass, the basis for computing the Belichick and Fisher numbers has changed, and achieving a BN of 12 will perhaps become commonplace.

But for those who were around for the glory of those 12 seasons of 12+ wins, set during the era of 16 game seasons... it will never be repeated, and it always will be remembered.
Click to expand...
That’s one thing that many “stats” fail to consider when classifying what any given player accomplishes in a season.

For example, the “1,000 yard season” threshold for a running back was based on a 12 game season, IIRC. So that means if you don’t get close to 100 yards a game, every single game, you won’t make it.

Of course in today’s NFL, being pass happy, and situational substitutions at RB, plus RB by committee, maybe this is a bad example, but you get my point.

There are a bunch of threshold for stats to define “greatness” that date from an era when the game was different, and they played fewer games, including number of playoff games.
 
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