Bill Belichick’s recent media blitz is all about damage control
For now, Belichick, whose stubbornness is both a superpower and a significant flaw, seems determined to charge through the noise.
It hardly qualifies as breaking news that Bill Belichick — professional sports’ unofficial all-time leader in press-conference grumbles, snorts, and non-answer answers — had little use for the media during his 24 seasons as Patriots coach, occasional engaging lectures on football minutiae notwithstanding.
But the reminder of his decades of dismissiveness with the media — save for the highest-profile, mutually beneficial friendships with the likes of Chris Berman, or esteemed producer Ken Rodgers and the brilliant folks at NFL Films — does serve a couple of purposes.
It amplifies Belichick’s hypocrisy in the two years since he was fired by Patriots owner Robert Kraft. Last season, Belichick used the media for image burnishing, taking no fewer than six television or podcast gigs and coming across in most as the Awkwardly Friendly Neighborhood Football Genius.
That was a form of self-promotion almost certainly designed to help him land another NFL head coaching gig. He was good TV — I missed him on Pat McAfee’s draft show last month — but the gambit did not pay off.
Belichick settled — and that is the right word, even if he would never admit it — for the head coaching gig at the University of North Carolina, an afterthought football program at a basketball school.
And now he finds himself using the media — or at least attempting to — for other reasons:
To sell his book, “The Art of Winning: Lessons from a Life in Football,’’ which has received mostly positive reviews, even if he doesn’t address his still puzzling decision to bench starting cornerback Malcolm Butler in Super Bowl LII in the chapter titled “Mistakes.”
Mostly, though, Belichick’s recent media appearances have been about damage control.
The 73-year-old Belichick’s relationship with 24-year-old Maine native Jordon Hudson had been public for a while, with pictures of them cavorting often popping up on her Instagram feed. (At what point, by the way, did everyone else realize she was born right around the time Tom Brady became the Patriots’ starting quarterback?)
But a media miscalculation by Belichick and Hudson put the relationship in the spotlight in April. During an interview with Tony Dokoupil on “CBS Sunday Morning,” Hudson, off-camera, interrupted a question for Belichick about how they had met, saying, “We’re not talking about this.” The clip went viral, in part because Hudson looked more like an overbearing stage manager than his “creative muse,’’ Belichick’s description of her in his book.
That, of course, led to even more gossip and theories about what exactly her role was in his life. A few days later, Belichick issued a statement saying that the interview was supposed to be about the book and Hudson was “doing her job to ensure the interview stayed on track.”
By then, it already had been reported that Belichick had asked North Carolina officials to include Hudson on all emails, suggesting she had some power within the football program. Reporting at various outlets has since revealed that she insisted on appearing in a Dunkin’ Donuts commercial with him, is deeply involved in his business dealings, and — this one must have been tough for Belichick — nixed a deal with NFL Films that would have featured the UNC program on “Hard Knocks.”
Pablo Torre, the former Sports Illustrated and ESPN writer who hosts the Peabody Award-nominated “Pablo Torre Finds Out” podcast, has unearthed several details on the relationship, including that she had been banned from North Carolina’s football facilities. (UNC issued a word-salad of a denial.)
Torre, whose podcast presumably will not be a stop on Belichick’s media tour, popped on with 98.5 The Sports Hub’s “Toucher and Hardy” program Thursday and reiterated, among other details, that some of Belichick’s family members are deeply concerned about the relationship.
“They are panicked that the thing that their family has built, that he has built as the patriarch of his family, the Logan Roy of their ‘Succession’ story,’’ said Torre. “That it’s being incinerated by a 24-year-old who doesn’t know what she’s doing.”
There’s an Heir Jordon joke here somewhere, but the Belichicks probably don’t want to hear it.
For now, Belichick, whose stubbornness is both a superpower and a significant flaw, seems determined to charge through the noise while limiting his interviews to familiar and friendly questioners.
On Friday, he appeared on “Good Morning America,’’ chatting with Michael Strahan, who went far easier on Belichick than he did in Super Bowl XLII.
After some football and book talk, Strahan — duly noting that Hudson was not in attendance — did eventually ask Belichick about the relationship
“We have a good personal relationship,” Belichick said. “I’m not talking about personal relationships, Michael. You know that.”
Strahan asked one last question: Is Belichick happy?
“Yeah,” he said.
“You look happy,” Strahan said.
“Yeah,” Belichick said once more.
He must be. Because after years of preaching to the Patriots about avoiding distractions, Belichick seems perfectly fine with having created a massive one for UNC.
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