Bill Belichick’s University of North Carolina football team, college sports’ strongest argument for open records laws, began spring practices this past weekend. As the 72-year-old head coach sorts through position battles and figures out who’s going to play quarterback, the real fun for outside observers is in getting a sense of how much Jordon Hudson, his 24-year-old girlfriend, will be doing for the program.
Belichick stocked his coaching ranks with various unsuccessful friends and associates, all of whom seem to understand this might be their final opportunity to harvest a salary from the putrescent corpse of the ex–New England Patriots coach’s legacy. According to emails uncovered by The Assembly in March, Belichick is farming out correspondence duties to Hudson, asking a UNC administrator to copy her on all emails sent to him. This week, the Athletic revealed some of those emails, which are pretty funny. Hudson does not work for the university, but she’s operating as some sort of professional liaison for her septuagenarian boyfriend and his big-headed son.
Before UNC announced the hiring of Steve Belichick as the team’s defensive coordinator, Hudson cautioned the media department to “raise awareness regarding a sometimes subtle, sometimes obvious, frequently occurring detail within media releases and social media posts.” Translation: Avoid mentioning that his father is the head coach.
From the Athletic:
“It is really worth emphasizing the point that Steve has the experience of being a COLLEGE defensive coordinator and will bring a plethora of knowledge to the coaching staff,” Hudson wrote. “I believe being strategic about the depiction of the Steve (sic) will prevent controversy and show upmost (sic) respect towards Steve’s career, validate Bill’s decision as a HC to hire Steve.”
Hudson had no suggestions for how to manage the hiring of Belichick’s other son, who joined the team as a defensive backs/safeties coach. Perhaps the depiction of the Brian is not as urgent a matter. The Athletic reports that Hudson’s email signature identifies her as the chief operating officer of a company called Belichick Productions. That is one of the five corporate entities she is managing, along with Chapel Bill LLC. That company is not to be confused with “Chapel Bill (Bill’s Version),” which is one of the 14 phrases for which Belichick applied for a trademark. A significant portion of Hudson’s correspondence with UNC employees is concerned with Belichick’s branding and the handling of their relationship.
From the Athletic:
“Is there anyone monitoring the UNC Football page for slanderous commentary and subsequently deleting it / blocking users that are harassing BB in the comments?” Hudson asked on Feb. 13.
On Valentine’s Day, Belichick followed up.
“I cannot believe that UNC would support my being called a ‘predator,'” he wrote.
Neither provided more details.
The Athletic’s article was published days after Hudson made what the New York Post called a “curious appearance” at UNC’s spring practice, in which she looked busy on the field and helped Belichick with a headset issue. I am excited to see how she runs the offense when she starts calling plays by October.
