Chapel Bill
Well that was a surprise.
Some rumors began floating the weekend before the news officially broke that Belichick was entertaining the UNC job. The UNC job? North Carolina? A college football team of zero notoriety? UNC is a basketball school. Surely you jest. He wants the win record. Reports made it sound like he made some high demands for UNC. Of course he would, he’s Belichick. He’s a control freak. He’s probably opening with a massive unreachable ask to UNC in negotiations because he knows they wouldn’t match it. They…did. It was official. Bill Belichick is now the new head coach of the University of North Carolina. What the fuck?
A week later with the dust settled I think the answer is pretty clear why: he wants to meet hot college co-eds in his area. He’s been dating a 25 year old woman for about a year now. If he can manage that, imagine how appealing he must be to broke college students deep in loan debt! He can grind some tape and then hit a kegger right down the street. Look, love can blossom from anywhere, but the concept of dating someone significantly younger than your own children is simply gross as hell.
The real answer is of course power and control. Like I posted in spring when Belichick didn’t get the Falcons job: Bill has to be in control. Bill had total control for 20 years in New England. It’s a style of team management that has gone out of style in the modern era. There’s no way a team would give him the level of control he had in New England with him being 72 and with a bad ending to his stint up north. He’d be forced to work with a GM he likely didn’t choose.
His options this spring looked to be places he likely would not have the level of control he wanted. Hell, the NFL doesn’t have the level of control he probably wants. The Salary Cap, the draft, all these measures to keep things in check that simply do not exist in college football. At UNC he can do whatever he wants if the school funds him (they will). I think he also chose UNC because it’s not a powerhouse football program with high expectations. He now has a level of power he has not ever had. I’d joke that he can’t recruit, but the man pulled a 25 year old girlfriend, clearly he has some ability to recruit. It is still very funny to imagine Bill stopping by the house of some high school athlete and grumpily going “commit, loser”.
He’s 72. I’m not sure how much time he actually has left with the ability to do the job. But I have to imagine UNC players might suddenly start rising in draft stock because you can’t get a much more pro-ready coach than Belichick teaching you how to play ball. Maybe that’s why he’s there. It’s going to be extremely weird next season seeing him on Saturdays and not Sundays, but that’s the world we live in now. Godspeed you old pervert.
I always felt that once his blue-eyed boy upped sticks for Tampa, his remaining time at Foxboro felt… kinda Cleveland-esque.
I must be imagining it. ☕️
I’m pretty sure Belichick is one of those coaches who is not good at evaluating potential jobs. He just got lucky that NE happened to be a good situation bit he isn’t really good a picking them to go to. Think about it, the other place he too a job was Cleveland. (Even he didn’t like the Jets situation)
Bellicheck should get a decent amount of recruits based on how well he coached. He made a lot of mistakes like Matt Patricia as OC.
But he should be able to convince recruits he’ll have them pro ready if they’re willing to learn and give 100%.
Also he can ditch his 25 year old gf for a 21 year old gf.
Punters of the 1940’s. Awesome.
Every relationship is different, but it is always eye-brow raising and, frankly, concerning when there is a huge age difference, particularly but far from exclusively when one person is under ~25 and the other is over (particularly if its significantly) 25. With that big a difference in age, knowledge, experience, and power/standing in society it really muddies the waters of whether the younger person is even capable of giving Free, Informed, and Enthusiastic Consent.
The fact that pretty much all of his coordinators have failed epically definitely also reinforces the level in which Belichick controlled and micro-managed everything. This could either be a windfall for UNC, or a disaster. I think the lack of parity, plus his fame being a draw, will mitigate the fact that he has been very hit and miss as a talent evaluator, plus he probably knows more about football than anyone else on the planet, so if he can get some halfway competent and, more importantly, teachable kids then he could go far.
This is one of those events that is so baffling and unexpected that even days after the fact, I have absolutely nothing to say about it beyond “Wow, really?”
So, if Drake Maye continues to play like the guy that Pats fans are praying for, would this go down as the most bizarre trade of all time? Sure, the teams didn’t actually trade with each other, but, I feel like we can treat it as the Patriots trading away Belichick for Maye, right?
You really need to make a Michael Penis Jr. comic, or drawing. Like, maybe draw him as his head as the head of a penis or something.