The North Carolina Tar Heels are still three months away from their 2025 season opener, but Bill Belichick’s tenure as the head coach in Chapel Hill has already produced an entire season’s worth of drama. Even if you put all of the drama right out of a soap opera surrounding Belichick’s 24-year-old girlfriend Jordan Hudson aside, we’re still talking about one of the greatest football coaches of all-time who likely has an itch to return to the NFL.
Whether the NFL is itching for Bill Belichick to return is another story. Belichick’s decision to take the job at the University of North Carolina was seemingly a result of a lack of interest in his services around the NFL, but that doesn’t mean that there won’t soon be a time when the NFL comes calling again. All it will take is just one team, and NFL insider Mike Florio has one particular team in mind.
“Last year, Belichick consigliere Michael Lombardi was spreading a false rumor that (Todd) Bowles may retire after the season, which sparked speculation that Belichick was eyeballing the Buccaneers,” writes Florio for Pro Football Talk. “So why would Lombardi be trying to speak a vacancy into existence? Maybe because that’s one of the jobs Belichick would want.”
It would be somewhat poetic if Belichick’s final NFL chapter came in Tampa Bay, where former New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady played his final game. But in order for Belichick’s final NFL stop to be in Tampa, it would mean current Buccaneers head coach Todd Bowles was cut loose at season’s end. Even though Bowles has led the Buccaneers to three consecutive NFC South Division titles, Florio explains that Tampa Bay’s “unique history” with head coaches indicates that the Buccaneers could indeed do something unexpected.
“Although Todd Bowles has won the NFC South in each of his three seasons as Tampa Bay’s head coach, the Buccaneers have a unique history, to say the least, when it comes to the coaching position. In 2009, they abruptly dumped Jon Gruden for Raheem Morris. Three years later, they hired Greg Schiano. They surprisingly fired Lovie Smith in 2016, apparently in order to avoid losing offensive coordinator Dirk Koetter to another team. And some still believe that Tom Brady’s unretirement in 2022 (after his path to Miami was blocked) was conditioned on Bruce Arians being nudged into retirement.”
Of course, this assumes that Belichick, at age 73, will still have something resembling a fast ball this season. Although the spotlight is shining bright on the Tar Heels, nobody in the College Football world is expecting North Carolina to seriously contend for an ACC title. With all of the distractions – some of which Belichick brought upon himself – this season could end up being a disastrous one for a man who is accustomed to winning at the highest level. And it that’s the case, don’t count on the NFL to come crawling back to him.
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