On ESPN’s College GameDay preview show last Saturday, the crew got around to discussing how much Bill Belichick has struggled in his first season as head coach of University of North Carolina (UNC), aka the North Carolina Tar Heels. Former player-turned-pundit Kirk Herbstreit was arguing that the six-time Super Bowl-winning head coach remained totally invested in his new job - even after three blow-out losses in his first five games prompted speculation about his future - when his smartphone rang. He recognised the caller immediately, started laughing and then showed the phone to his fellow analyst Pat McAfee.
“Answer that!” shouted McAfee. “He has to be watching right now. That’s literally Bill Belichick calling Kirk Herbstreit. He probably has something to say.”
“Yeah,” said Herbstreit. “He probably does.”
The call went to voicemail and everybody chuckled heartily. When he departed the New England Patriots in 2023, after a record-setting 24-season tenure, nobody could have envisaged Belichick becoming a national punchline, comic cannon fodder for bloviating pundits trying to hold viewers’ attention in the eternal hours of chatter before kick-off.
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No coach has won more Super Bowls or play-off games, yet he appears unwanted by the NFL. Two months into his first campaign there is so much talk of UNC paying $20 million to terminate his contract he had to issue a denial.
“Reports about my looking for a buyout or trying to leave here is categorically false,” said Belichick last Monday. “There’s zero truth to any of that. I’m glad I’m here. We’re working toward our goals. We believe very much in the process. We need to just keep working and grinding away.”
It wasn’t meant to be like this. After UNC announced it had signed Belichick to a five-year deal worth $50 million last December, every seat for every game at Kenan Stadium this season soon sold out. Not a normal occurrence on a campus where the basketball team has traditionally been the main box-office draw. For the home opener against Texas Christian University, Michael Jordan – the most famous North Carolina Tar Heels player of all – turned up. He sat alongside Lawrence Taylor, the fearsome New York Giants linebacker who won Super Bowls with Belichick, then assistant coach, back in the 1980s.
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The celebrity duo endured a 48-14 drubbing, the manner of the defeat suggesting the 73-year-old had much to learn about the essential difference between college and the pro game. So it has proved.
Before bringing his team to take on the University of Central Florida (UCF), he was perceived to be disrespectful to the opponent in a press conference. UCF responded by hammering the visitors 34-9 and then posting mocking references online to viral images of Belichick and his 24-year-old girlfriend Jordon Hudson performing yoga on a beach.
A week after that trouncing, Clemson ran up 28 points against UNC in the first quarter, the Kenan Stadium stands started to empty at half-time. Local media outlet WRAL subsequently ran a detailed story about a divided locker room, a chronic lack of communication from beleaguered coaching staff and accusations of players recruited by Belichick getting preferential treatment.
Initially, he sold the university to incoming players as the place to hone their skills for future pro careers. Lately, he has banned some league scouts from training. When former UNC quarterback Drake Maye started to light things up with the New England Patriots, Belichick – still reeling from the manner of his departure from the club – prohibited the college from making references to Maye’s success on social media. Ordinarily, an alumnus doing well would be trumpeted by any school as an easy way of impressing potential new recruits.
On that score, Belichick has appeared out of touch with a college grid-iron scene that has become more complicated in the past few years. It is now an environment where the coach must persuade high-school stars they can improve under his tutelage while also guaranteeing the best of the juicy financial packages around Name Image Likeness (NIL) earning ability. Taking time off in mid-season to vacation in Nantucket, as he did last week, has convinced detractors the septuagenarian doesn’t appreciate how much of his spare time needs to be spent wooing teen starlets. Or worse, he couldn’t care less.
Every aspect of his tenure is over-analysed and becomes instant national news because the media relishes this Learesque postscript to his distinguished career. Boorish and unnecessarily difficult with the press for decades, he could afford to behave badly when helming perennial Super Bowl contenders. Journalists then needed him more than he ever needed them. Having tolerated his ignorant, ill-mannered schtick for so long, many are enjoying watching him squirm now. His problems on the field have been matched by questionable romantic antics off it.
That soap operatic sideshow, replete with himself and his true love canoodling on the sidelines, is the stuff of tabloid editors’ dreams. Of 57 photos taken by Getty Images at the Clemson defeat, 23 of them were of Hudson. She recently made news of her own when the US Patent Office turned down her application to trademark catchphrases made famous by Belichick as a Patriot. Among the slogans was “Do Your Job!”. UNC fans wish he would.
