Bill Belichick tests the 'any publicity is good publicity' rule
The football coach, the much younger girlfriend, and an interview that went off the rails. PLUS: The Stanley Cup playoffs, and Coach Prime
Bill Belichick is 73 years old. His girlfriend, Jordon Hudson, is 24. Let’s just get that out of the way right there.
Is this a little … weird? Perhaps even, I don’t know, icky? That’s been a fairly common reaction to the story of the greatest NFL coach of all time and his new(ish) partner and business manager. But who am I to judge? Maybe we should all just be happy that those crazy kids have found each other. Whatever the former New England Patriots coach gets up to in his private life is his business.
Except, young Ms. Hudson has become very much a part of Belichick’s public life in recent months, which has led to a series of stories that awkwardly tiptoe around the disparity in their years on Earth — no one wants to be accused of ageism — while all basically reaching the same conclusion, which is: what the hell?
There was the one from last month in which Belichick, in his new role as head coach at the University of North Carolina, asked communications staff at the school to copy Hudson on all emails to him.
There was one from this week that suggested HBO, which had planned to feature UNC in Hard Knocks, its annual documentary series that usually follows the preseason of an NFL team, bailed on the project when Hudson became too involved.
There was the video of Hudson at a UNC practice, in which she is wearing white boots with heels while walking about the field. The grounds crew would not have been pleased.
And, there has been the big ol’ controversy about Belichick’s interview with CBS to promote his new book, in which the CBS host described Hudson as “a constant presence” during the talk. CBS aired clips that showed her interrupting to shoot down a question about how Belichick and Hudson met. Belichick issued a statement in response to say that Hudson was just doing her job in trying to keep the interview focused on the book, which prompted CBS to say that it never agreed to limitations on the interview about what could be asked.
A couple of things here: News outlets never agree to interviews with an author that restrict all questions to the book itself. Publishers know this. CBS Sunday Morning, the program in question, has no interest in producing a Belichick story solely on The Art of Winning: Lessons from my Life in Football, because frankly that sounds pretty boring. They were always going to ask about his split from the Patriots, and, yes, his young girlfriend who has taken some kind of professional role in his new college job. (She is not employed by the school but has referred to herself as the chief operating officer of Belichick Productions, though reporters have been unable to find proof that such a company exists.)
Also, this:
Is the ratty old sweatshirt with a big hole in it supposed to be cool? Is it a weird homage to Belichick’s tendency to wear hoodies with the sleeves cut off while on the sideline? Why didn’t he go the whole way and sit down for the CBS cameras wearing something with mustard stains on it?
The fallout from this interview has been wide. Reporters have noted that Belichick, known for controlling every aspect of the Patriots’ football operations, seems to be demurring to the wishes of his girlfriend/manager at this point in his life. There’s been speculation that Hudson was behind Belichick’s brief, intense foray into media work last fall, when he suddenly joined social media platforms and signed up for recurring on roles on several outlets, including ESPN. The guy who never made a secret of his disdain for the media while with the Pats was now happy to talk football with seemingly anyone who asked. If that media gambit was supposed to grease the wheels for a return to the NFL after he failed to get a head-coach gig in the 2024 offseason, it didn’t work: he ended up taking the college job in December, after it became clear that NFL teams that had fired their coaches mid-season were not exactly knocking down his door.
So, what now? As much as some Belichick allies have responded to the CBS mess by encouraging him to, er, compartmentalize his relationship with Hudson, he can pretty much do whatever he wants. UNC gave him a $50-million contract to try to turn their football program from a non-factor in the college landscape into a major power, and even now it still seems bizarre that they landed a coach who won a record six Super Bowls with the Patriots. They will tolerate whatever footwear Hudson chooses on their fields if it keeps Belichick in Chapel Hill.
But this story, which was once limited to tittering about the red-carpet photos and Instagram shots of the couple separated by almost 50 years of age, has broken containment. Major outlets are reporting on every development, meaning there were stories about the CBS interview, his reaction to it, and then CBS’ response to his reaction. The PR department at UNC must be having flop sweats. The Washington Post had a headline this week, Bill Belichick and Jordon Hudson’s relationship is everyone’s business now. That is, strictly speaking, not true. But the narrative that Hudson is overly influential is out there now. Let’s see how the rest of the book tour goes.
Squeaky-bum time in the Stanley Cup playoffs
Recent columns of mine for theScore include one on the Toronto Maple Leafs and their spectacular inability to not do things easily. Note: This was published before their latest loss, which pushed their record from 1-12 in closeout games to 1-13. 🚨😬🚨
I also wrote about the goings-on in West, where the Edmonton Oilers started poorly but then rallied, and the Winnipeg Jets started well then swooned. Of note, both teams have since won their Game 5s to take 3-2 series leads. Whew.
The Shedeur discourse
If you somehow managed to miss it, one of the stories of last weekend’s NFL Draft was the plummet of Shedeur Sanders, son of Deion, from a possible top-5 pick to a fifth-round lottery ticket. The part of the saga that is particularly strange to me, and which I wrote about this week, is that Coach Prime should have seen this coming. Shouldn’t he?