Belichick cover story is huge boon to N Magazine

Patriots coach Bill Belichick and girlfriend Linda Holliday on the cover of N Magazine.

N Magazine has put more than a few famous faces on its cover, everyone from former Senator John Kerry and Olympic figure skater Dorothy Hamill to Pulitzer Prize-winning writer David Halberstam and singer Meghan Trainor.

But no Nantucket nabob has moved the needle like Bill Belichick. Indeed, this summer’s N Magazine featuring the Patriots coach and his girlfriend Linda Holliday was a phenomenon, says founder and publisher Bruce A. Percelay, becoming the most successful issue in the glossy monthly’s 15-year history.

“Our website crashed,’’ says Percelay. “We knew that people in Massachusetts viewed [Belichick] in god-like terms, but we really didn’t anticipate the national fascination.’’

The story, an uncharacteristically soft and fuzzy portrait of the Pats coach that included pictures of him — gasp! — smiling, was picked up everywhere: People.com, Sports Illustrated, ESPN, and TMZ all ran with it. Predictably, Twitter and nattering sports-talk types mocked the story, which only helped it go viral.

Percelay estimates that “tens of millions’’ of people saw the Belichick piece, compared to the 140,000 or so readers N Magazine typically attracts.

“Bill Belichick is the one person, perhaps with the exception of Tom Brady — believe me, we’re working on that — who would generate that type of buzz and attention,’’ said Percelay. “It put us on another level.’’

That got us wondering if President Trump has any connection to the island that could get him on the cover. Not really, though he did attend a fund-raiser on Nantucket last summer, and his son, Don Jr., has spent time on the island.

Anyway, N Magazine is careful to play it down the middle, politically.

“The island has a lot of prominent players on both sides of the aisle,’’ Percelay said. “We try to be fair and balanced.’’