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Counter.most_common

As explained in Python Workout: 50 ten-minute exercises

Counter.most_common is a method that returns counted items and their frequencies in descending frequency order, optionally limited to a specified number of items.

Counter.most_common() returns (item, frequency) tuples ordered from highest to lowest frequency. Pass an integer n to keep only the n most common items. section 3.17

Find the most repeated letter

Counter(word).most_common(1)[0][1] selects one top result, extracts its tuple, then returns its count. This supports a function that compares words by their highest letter frequency. section 3.17 section 3.16

>>> Counter('abcabcabbbc').most_common()    #1
[('b', 5), ('a', 3), ('c', 3)]

A complete result shows each item paired with its count and arranged in descending frequency order. section 3.17

How Python Workout: 50 ten-minute exercises covers it

How deep it goes
Explains return tuples, descending order, integer limits, and chained indexing, but does not develop implementation internals.
Examples
Uses letter counts in words, including elementary and abcabcabbbc, then compares words by their top letter count.
What it assumes
Assumes familiarity with sequences and functions while introducing Counter as a dict subclass for counting.
What you can do after
Apply it via Counter to retrieve ranked frequency pairs or extract the count of the single most common item.
How it connects
Connects Counter with dict, sequences, max, and the key parameter.
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