Three weeks ago today, North Carolina coach Bill Belichick turned the football world upside down with a stunning CBS interview during which: (1) he wore a really old football jersey with a hole in the neck; and (2) his 24-year-old (and possibly 23-year-old) girlfriend/handler/publicist Jordon Hudson instructed him not to answer the hard-hitting question of how they met and reportedly created other disruptions, including reportedly storming off the set.
It created a storm of scrutiny for Belichick, turning the notoriously team-focused coach into the one thing he hated most on any football team: A distraction.
Belichick hasn't just been a distraction to his North Carolina football. He's been a MASSIVE distraction.
As former Patriots quarterback Cam Newton recently observed, "You can’t name me three players on North Carolina’s roster right now besides Jordon Hudson."
Now, UNC has hired veteran sports P.R. executive Brandon Faber, and the effort to both clean up the mess while also actively promoting Belichick's book has commenced. He has submitted to several interviews this week, from the biggest of networks to the smallest of podcasts.
Belichick's most significant interview yet happened not with a former on-field nemesis (ABC's Michael Strahan) but with former Inside the NFL colleague Ryan Clark. Appearing on Clark's The Pivot Podcast, Belichick offered up his version of Hudson's involvement with his current professional life in a setting that guaranteed no follow-up questions pressing him on potential factual inconsistencies or seeking clarification or elaboration.
Basically, in a one-on-one with Clark before his co-hosts, Fred Taylor and Channing Crowder, joined the interview, Belichick was able to articulate and promulgate the strategically concocted spin on Belichick's P.R. tailspin.
While we have no issue with someone doing a favor to a friend and/or former colleague, it's fair game to point out that this is exactly what happened. Indeed, three weeks after Tony Dokoupil of CBS tried to serve up softballs, Clark put his Hudson-related questions for Belichick on a T-ball.
The interview started with Clark asking Belichick why it was important to name Hudson in the "acknowledgments" section of the book. He explained that she had ideas for the book, such as addressing Tom Brady on page 199 (since he was the 199th pick in the draft) and Lawrence Taylor on page 56 (since he wore the number Abdul Carter recently tried to get permission to wear). Belichick also said that he tapped into the 24-year-old's (possibly 23-year-old’s) extensive business acumen to dumb down the football jargon. (Typically, books published by major houses like Simon & Schuster will assign a specific editor who is on the payroll to, you know, "do your job.")
It was apparently no coincidence that Clark started things off with a question about the reason for mentioning her in the book. Like a good lawyer who knows the answer to every question he asks, Clark deftly led Belichick into the broader point to be made, as part of Belichick's attack on the CBS interview.
"The first thing you did was the CBS interview," Clark said. "That question wasn't asked about Jordon in that interview?"
"It was asked," Belichick said. "No, it was asked. They asked about her — the same, similar question that you asked about her acknowledgement in the book. And I explained that in the tribute pages that she did, but that wasn't shown."
(Hey, CBS, how about releasing the full interview now? Belichick is basically daring you to do it.)
Next, Clark asked a question that tried to turn the "distraction" angle on its head. Basically, the argument is that Hudson isn't a distraction; she's there to help keep Belichick stay focused on football and not be distracted.
"A lot of what we got from that [CBS interview] was obviously, you know, some of the things saying that she interrupted and, you know, didn't necessarily cooperate through that process," Clark said. "In a lot of what you do, and I'm sure, you know, in part of this book, it's maybe spoken about, it's 'don't be a distraction,' right? And there are former players of yours and media members who are saying, because of your current relationship, you may be or may have become that. How are you staying focused on football as the main thing to make sure that that's not something that's happening?"
"Yeah, that's what I do, is I stay focused on football and some of the other opportunities that come along, you know, Jordan looks at those and, you know, can dig into them a little bit deeper," Belichick said. "But, really, what she does helps me spend my time on football, and that's what's important to me."
Clark then focused on the one question that has never been fully answered, by Belichick or anyone: "For specifics for people, because I believe that this is definitely one of those questions that are out there, and people are making up their own stories, creating their own narrative. What does Jordan actually do for you that allows you to do your job? What are her actual job responsibilities?"
"Well, nothing with North Carolina," Belichick said. "That would be number one. It would be personal opportunities. Could be a speaking thing, it could be a, you know, appearance on this or talk about that or somebody wants whatever happens to be — an autograph or that type of thing. And so, you know, she would kind of help organize that for me.
"And one of the first things that came out was when North Carolina sent me emails saying, like, 'These people want to talk to you, these people want to talk to you, these people want to talk to you, these people want to talk to you.' I sent back an email saying, 'Can you please copy Jordan on these requests?' Right? So that, you know, she could at least, like, filter through them, because there was nobody. We didn't have a sports information guy. That was taken because all the emails are shared in publicly — that was taken as Jordan's running the sports information department. And that also led to the narrative, which is, like, totally — she's not doing it. I mean, there was nobody to help me sort them out, so I was asking her to do that."
Hang on, Billy Boy. We need to press pause at this point. Did you catch what he's doing? He's throwing North Carolina under the bus for not having a proper mechanism in place to handle P.R. for the football operation.
"There was nobody," Belichick said. "We didn't have a sports information guy."
That's simply not true. Entering the 2024 season, UNC had two employees assigned to football communications: (1) Jeremy Sharpe, the "Assistant AD, Football Communications & Branding"; and (2) Tyler Timm, the "Associate Director (Secondary Football Contact)."
Sharpe's online bio is still active. His title suggests that he was reassigned to "Women's Soccer, Swimming & Diving, Women's Lacrosse." The body of the bio has not yet been revised to show he's no longer working for the football organization.
"Sharpe serves as the primary media relations contact for Carolina football and head coach Mack Brown, while overseeing all external branding initiatives for the program," the bio explains. "He also oversees all football social media and serves as the primary liaison between the football program and Go Heels Productions and Creative Services, Athletic Communications, Athletics Marketing and other supporting units."
So one of two things happened when Mack Brown was fired and Belichick was hired. Either UNC affirmatively took Sharpe out of a role he held for six years and left Belichick with no P.R. representative at all, or Belichick himself decided it was better to have no one (and in turn to rely on his 24/23-year-old girlfriend) than it was to have Sharpe. Our guess is that it was Option No. 2 (which would put the blame on him), and that Belichick is now trying to make it look like it was Option No. 1 (which puts the blame on the program).
The overriding narrative from Belichick is that Jordon has nothing to do with football, with the inescapable implication being that she never did.
That's also not true. The emails obtained through public records requests (since UNC is a public organization) show that she was involved in advising staff on how to properly downplay the role of nepotism in the hiring Belichick's son, Steve, to serve as defensive coordinator, and in pushing back against the organization's failure to scrub from its website comments that were critical of Belichick. (One specific gripe was that one commenter called him a "predator.")
Also, Hudson was on the field during the final spring practice. And not with a friends-and-family sideline pass. She was working. As previously noted, Brandon Faber can be seen in foreground of the video. So, by the end of spring practice, Belichick had an outside P.R. person in the building (even if he hadn't been officially "hired") and Hudson was still doing football stuff.
All of this means one thing. Every time Belichick says that Hudson has nothing to do with football, in a broad, sweepingly dismissive manner that suggests she never had anything to do with football, he's being disingenuous at best. At worst, he's lying through the hole in his shirt.
He probably thinks the interview with Clark made things better. To those who haven't delved into the nooks and crannies of the story, maybe it will — especially since many in the media will simply recite Belichick's self-serving quotes without scrutiny or analysis.
Still, the folks at UNC can't be thrilled about the unmistakable impression that Belichick is blaming Hudson's non-employment employment by the football program on a not-so-subtle claim that North Carolina failed to provide the most basic and fundamental level of competence and support to the greatest coach of all time.
Meanwhile, June 1 is only two weeks away.
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