NCAA
Bill Belichick accepts offer from UNC on these conditions: What we know about the agreement with the Tar Heels
According to one report, the former Patriots coach has a long list of strict demands for UNC if he is to accept a head coaching deal with the school.
In January 2024, after two decades, Bill Belichick and the New England Patriots severed ties in news that sent a tremor through the NFL world.
Since then, the veteran coach has embarked on a career in media while still declaring himself an active head coach and has made a handful of appearances on both ESPN‘s The Pat McAfee Show as well as appearing on Manningcast.
However, the 72-year-old still misses his first love of coaching and has potentially found his way back into the game.
Belichick’s 400-page bible of demands for UNC
After several reports that Belichick had been interviewing with interested teams, it’s now been reported that he would accept a deal with UNC...on certain conditions.
The reports that the deal has been accepted are not yet confirmed, but according to The Guardian’s Ollie Connolly, the 72-year-old has agreed to coach for UNC, but presented them with a list of demands that he is “unwilling to negotiate” before he will fully commit.
According to Connolly, these demands are listed in a 400-page “organizational bible”, which Belichick shared with other schools but customized for UNC. They include “structure, payment plans, staffing choices and salary minimums position by positions” that “would require historic levels of investment from the school.” It also states that UNC would need to hire a coaching staff run by Belichick and a recruitment staff run by a sitting college general manager who would be bought out of his current contract.
Connolly says the school is meant to give Belichick a decision within 24 hours.
“There has already been pushback from the group of 13 trustees, with input from wider faculty. The investment would overhaul the school’s approach to football,” Connolly writes. “Belichick [is] unsure if the school will meet the demands and is unwilling to negotiate.”
Belichick previously told Pat McAfee that he would indeed like to change the college football philosophy to make it more of an NFL prep program.
“Let me put this in capital letters: IF I was in a college program, the college program would be a pipeline to the NFL for the players that had the ability to play in the NFL,” Belichick said. “It would be a professional program. Training, nutrition, scheme, coaching, techniques that would transfer to the NFL. It would be an NFL program at a college level.”
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