Skip Bayless Breaks Silence After Hall of Fame Voters Punish Bill Belichick

This article was originally published on Total Pro Sports.

Skip Bayless has been planting flags on Bill Belichick for over a decade. The sports personality finally got his vindication Tuesday when Hall of Fame voters denied the legendary coach first-ballot entry into Canton. While Patriots fans and NFL stars expressed shock, Bayless posted a video explaining why he saw this coming from miles away. His take? Six Super Bowls don’t erase the deeper problems with Belichick’s resume.

Bayless dropped a lengthy video breakdown on Tuesday addressing Belichick’s failure to secure the required 40 votes for Hall of Fame induction. The coach fell short despite eight Super Bowl appearances and 333 career wins. “Does Bill Belichick eventually deserve to go in the Pro Football Hall of Fame? Well, obviously he does, but am I surprised that voters punished him by making him wait one year? Not at all,” Bayless stated. He called the snub punishment, not rejection.

Bill Belichick is being turned into something that he always wanted to be, which was a lovable, sympathetic figure. pic.twitter.com/SdAsoOMwKr

— Skip Bayless (@RealSkipBayless) January 28, 2026

The heart of Bayless’ argument centers on scandals that plagued Belichick’s Patriots tenure. “Obviously the main reason that Bill Belichick was punished was Spygate,” Bayless said, referencing the 2007 incident where former defensive coordinator Eric Mangini turned in his old boss for illegally taping signals. Don Shula publicly called Belichick “Belicheat” after that controversy. Deflategate also factored in, according to Bayless, who insisted the coach knew everything about those underinflated footballs.

But Bayless saved his sharpest criticism for Belichick’s record without Tom Brady. The numbers tell a brutal story that voters clearly remembered.

The 65-82 Record That Sank Bill Belichick

Here’s where Bayless drove home his long-held position on Brady versus Belichick. The coach started 5-11 in his first New England season before Brady “sort of fell out of the heavens” as a sixth-round pick in 2001. After Brady left for Tampa and won another championship, Belichick went 29-38 in four seasons with New England. Add his Cleveland years, and you get 65 wins against 82 losses without Brady as his quarterback.

“That means he lost 27 more games than he won without Tom Brady as a head coach,” Bayless pointed out. Eight of 10 seasons without Brady ended in missing the playoffs. The only postseason game Belichick coached after Brady, Josh Allen’s Bills scored 37 points without punting once. That was supposed to be the defensive genius showing his prowess.

Then came the final gut punch. Eight NFL teams had coaching vacancies this cycle. Nobody hired Belichick. He took the North Carolina job instead and went 4-8 in his first college season. They also remembered years of Belichick treating reporters with contempt, always mumbling non-answers or saying he was “onto Cincinnati.” Those same reporters hold votes.