football -----Vince Lombardi, Knute Rockne, Fielding Yost
basketball ---John Wooden, Red Auerbach
baseball -----Casey Stengel
hockey -------Herb Brooks
and for the single, best coach (and player) in any sport----DAN GABLE (Wrestling). 17 NCAA Championships in 21 seasons - absolutely incredible!
-- Modified on 3/4/2010 12:20:09 PM
If the metric is the number of championships, then Phil has Red beat. Arguments can go both ways in comparing the early years and the later years, but Jackson did it with 3 different teams. Yes, the Lakers with Shaq and without him. You can't use the argument of talent, as there were far fewer teams back in the days with no free agency, and the Celtics always had the best talent.
It would probably be best to separate college from pro. Yes, Wooden is #1 with Dean Smith a close 2nd.
With respect to football, I have to give a nod to Bill Walsh. He completely revolutionized offense with the West Coast offense. And can we forget Don "Air" Coryell? He needs to be in the Hall of Fame.
Auerbach dominated his time period like no other, save Wooden.
Football = Baer Bryant
Basketball = Abe Saperstein. Dean Smith
Baseball = Billy Martin
Hockey = don't have a clue
You see i didn't rate them by # of championships
I saw the piece on Dan Gable. Great recruiter/motivator
-- Modified on 3/4/2010 5:27:16 PM
has to do with barroom brawls.
Agree with you on Bear-loved him-lived in B'ham in the 70's and used to watch his game followup shows-he was a trip- Lombardi was awesome too
BUT ABE Saperstein? If your team was playing the Washington Generals every night, you'd be a great coach too-heh heh and Dean Smith-didn't love him-he was notorious for calling TO's in the last minute with big leads against teams and especially my beloved Blue Devils, which would set my Old Man into violent paroxysms of profanity and vile epithets against Deano-I think Dean should have won more national titles than he did and he totally blew the 77 game v Marquette by going into that 4 corner stuff way too early and destroying his team's mo-Wooden was the greatest college coach in my view-but Deano was a good one- I'll go with Scotty Bowman in Hockey and Joe MacCarthy in baseball-Billy could drink and raise hell though-smile 1rob...OUT 8-)
-- Modified on 3/4/2010 3:36:59 PM
Totally agree about Dean Smith. With the talent he had over the years, he should have won a minimum of 5 titles.
Right, Mookster-and Michael Jordan and the kid from Georgetown who threw it to Worthy bailed him out in 82 and Chris Webber bailed him out in 93 with his time out (sorry to reopen old wounds, CYNIC-smile)
8 pennants and 7 WS. He was one of the greatest.
HI, KK,
MacCarthy was the Yankee manager from 1031 to 1946-I'm old, but not that old-smile-read about him and couldn't think of any other top managers-see you soon! 1rob
College football - Bear Bryant
Hockey - Scotty Bowman
Pro Football - Vince Lombardi
Pro Basketball - Phil Jackson
College Basketball - John Wooden
1950-1975, 1975-2000, and 2000-2025.
1950-1975 FB-Lobmardi, Bryant
BK-Auerbach, Wooden
BB-Casey Stengel
Hockey-Scotty Bowman
1975-2000 FB-Parcells (multiple teams with success), Bud Wilkenson (Oklahoma had longest winning streak) & Bobby Bowden (FSU had 14 years in a row of top 4 finishes in the polls)
BK-Phil Jackson (NBA Championships with multiple teams), Coach K (NCAA and Olympic titles)
BB-Bobby Cox (run of 11 playoff appearances)
Hockey-Herb Brooks (do you believe in miracles?)
2000-2010 (so far) FB-Belececk, Urban Meyer
BK-Jackson, Roy Williams
BB-Joe Torre
Hockey-??
I must recuse myself from this thread.
Thank you
2010 = 28
BTW CYNIC you and liorr pals ? ? ? buds ???? perhaps there will be having a beer summit soon ? ? ? LOL.....LOL.....LOL
A chorus of 'Kumbaya' is forthcomming i'm sure.
two would be mind-boggling.