Top Winning Percentage NFL Coaches

In this edition we are going to go over the coaches who have the best winning percentage in the NFL all-time! 

Recently I downloaded some coaching stats from Pro-Football-Reference.com. in doing so I came across a couple of interesting items that we can post. One is the career winning percentage leaders of NFL coaches. There are a handful or what I would guess are interim coaches that were undefeated with one or maybe two games. I will probably write something up on them at a later date. The topic point I wanted to look at in this post is the top winning percentages of NFL head coaches that have a minimum of 40 games. 

The data used is from the 1920 season through the 2021 season, 102 years of NFL football. I found the results to be most interesting and to me surprising in a couple of cases.

1. Matt LaFleur ~ 39-10-0 for 0.796 : It did not hurt a bit with adopting stud QB Aaron Rodgers fromt he previous regime!
2. Guy Chamberlin ~ 58-16-7 for 0.784 : He was the coach that took multiple teams to the early league Championships. Canton 1923, Cleveland 1924, and Frankford 1926
3. John Madden ~ 103-32-7 for 0.759 : He was a lot more than just a video game! This brilliant coach took an up and coming Oakland team fromt he AFL to Super Bowl XI and the Lombardi Trophy.
4. Vince Lombardi ~ 96-34-6 for 0.738 : What can we say about this coach? He adopted a 1-10 team and won 5 NFL titles in nine years and has the NFL's Championship Trophy named after him!
5. George Allen ~ 116-47-5 for 0.712 : As the head coach of the LA Rams and Washington Redskins for a total of 12 seasons, his squads in the NFL never had a losing season.
6. Jim Harbaugh ~ 44-19-1 for 0.695 : As an NFL boss he led the San Francisco 49ers for four seasons from 2011 to 2014, going to three NFC Championship Games and losing Super Bowl XLVII to his brother John's Baltimore Ravens.
7. Tommy Hughitt ~ 34-15-7 for 0.694 : The legendary player/coach of the Buffalo All-Americans from 1920 through 1924. His teams arguably should have had at least one APFA/NFL Title in there. Never had a losing season in the Pros as a coach.
8. Blanton Collier ~ 76-34-2  0.691 : Assistant coach of the Cleveland under the great Paul Brown, and then adopted the squad Brown built. His team win the 1964 NFL championship and he too never had a losing season in 8 years as the head man.
9. Ray Flaherty ~ 80-37-5 for  0.684: He coached for 12 seasons from 1935 through 1949 in the NFL/AAFC. The Boston Redskins, New York Yankees and the Chicago Hornets. Coach the AAFC's Chicago franchise and still make this list? That's impressive!
10. George Halas ~ 148-31 for 0.682 : 40 years of coaching the franchise he owned! He led Chicago to 6 APFA/NFL Titles and only 6 seasons where his team went below .500!
11. Sean McVay  ~ 55-26-0 for 0.679 : He may just be getting started! At 36 years old and five seasons in the NFL as a head coach so far, he has won a Super Bowl, lost another one and had some outstanding players on his roster.
12. Don Shula ~ 328-156-6 for 0.677 : Coach at the end of the 2021 season has the most NFL victories of any sideline boss. he won NFL Titles in Baltimore and Miami and lost a handful of others championship games.

Other winning coaches that were under consideration:

• Paul Brown  ~  0.672 Winning %
• Bill Belichick  ~  0.67 Winning %
• Tony Dungy    ~ 0.668 Winning %
• Jim Lee Howell   ~ 0.663 Winning %
• Roy Andrews    ~ 0.654 Winning %
• George Seifert   ~ 0.648 Winning %
• Red Miller  ~ 0.645 Winning %
• Mike Tomlin  ~ 0.643 Winning %
• Andy Reid  ~ 0.633 Winning %
• Curly Lambeau  ~ 0.631 Winning %
• Sean Payton  ~ 0.631 Winning %
• Mike Vrabel  ~  0.631 Winning %
• Barry Switzer  ~  0.625 Winning %
• Bruce Arians   ~  0.624 Winning %
• Mike Martz  ~  0.624 Winning %
• Bill Cowher  ~ 0.623 Winning %
• Bud Grant  ~ 0.621 Winning %
• Joe Gibbs ~ 0.621 Winning %
• Buck Shaw  ~  0.621 Winning %