Cleveland Days

The NFL is truly like a fraternity at times. There are so many players and coaches who go back a long ways. Coach Belichick can always shed some interesting insight when he talks about some of his relationships over the course of his career. We saw a great example of that this week during his interview on Showtime's "Inside the NFL".

He was being interviewed by basketball Hall of Famer Charles Barkley and NFL analyst Chris Collingsworth. Barkley and Belichick go back to their days in Cleveland when they dined out on a number of occasions. Collingsworth was recruited by Belichick's father for the U.S. Naval Academy, but went elsewhere.

Their discussion of the show's regular hosts, Phil Simms and Warren Sapp brought some great observations. Belichick was a first year special teams coach for the New York Giants in 1979 when the team used it's first round draft pick for Simms. They had a great history together with the Giants, winning two Super Bowls.

Belichick wanted to draft Sapp in 1995, but was over ruled by the Brown's upper management and owner. Ironically, the Pats and Coach Bill Parcells would select CB Ty Law in that first round.