Bill Belichick Favored to Win Coach of the Year For 2020 Season

With Tom Brady gone, Bill Belichick has his biggest task in front of him. But oddsmakers believe he will figure it out.

New England Patriots head coach Bill Belichick has a tall task in front of him for 2020, which involves winning football games without quarterback Tom Brady. 

The Patriots will attempt to sustain their winning culture into a third decade with 2019 fourth-round pick Jarrett Stidham leading the pack, as he seemingly looks to be the starting QB over veteran Brian Hoyer for the 2020 season. While the odds of Stidham becoming a good starting quarterback are long, oddsmakers giving New England's head coach strong odds for a certain award may hint at how they feel Stidham will perform in his sophomore season. 

Here are the odds for who will win the AP Coach of the Year award for the 2020 NFL season, according to SportsLine:

Bill Belichick: +850

Bruce Arians: +1200

Kyle Shanahan: +1400

Mike McCarthy: +1400

Cliff Kingsbury: +1400

Frank Reich: +1400

Kevin Stefanski: +1500

Over his two-decade tenure as the Patriots head coach, Belichick has compiled 237 wins and six championships. However, despite overcoming some tremendous feats during that time span, he has just three Coach of the Year awards to his name, with the latest one coming in 2010. But much of that likely has to do with the fact that he's had the greatest quarterback of all-time on his team for the past two decades. 

Now that Brady is no longer a part of the Patriots organization, oddsmakers apparently believe that Belichick can pull off the improbable by exceeding expectations and winning football games with Stidham as his starting quarterback. One has to think winning the division and a playoff game would earn Belichick COY honors for the 2020 season, though as we've seen before, all it takes is a great season-long performance from anyone else in the league for Belichick to get snubbed. 

If the Patriots are able to win the division and a playoff game, that will likely happen because of strong quarterback play from Stidham. So one can guess that oddmakers believe Stidham will perform well as a starter in New England in 2020.