Bill Belichick Has Not Signed North Carolina Contract

Opting out of a second ride on the NFL HC carousel, Bill Belichick made a preemptive strike by accepting an offer to coach at North Carolina in December. Despite connections to the Raiders and then Cowboys, Belichick is on the recruiting trail at the ACC school.

If an NFL team were to poach Belichick after he committed to the Tar Heels, a $10MM buyout would need to be paid to the university. Though, a gray area now exists with regards to the buyout. Belichick has not signed an official contract with the school, CBS Sports’ Jonathan Jones reports. Instead, he is working in Chapel Hill after agreeing to a term sheet December 11. The school confirmed this, via Jones.

That term sheet outlines Belichick’s $10MM-per-year salary and would be set to precede a signed contract at some point. It is not too uncommon at the college level for coaches to begin working without a fully signed deal, but Jones adds a notable wrinkle here by indicating the term sheet Belichick inked is not binding. This could introduce a potential complication if the buyout — $10MM before June 1, $1MM after that date — comes into play.

Earlier this week, a report surfaced indicating the North Carolina athletic director and the ACC commissioner were uneasy about Belichick’s status. Jones has also previously reported NFL teams have not been intimidated by the $10MM buyout number, and the reporter adds some within the UNC community are a bit nervous related to this component of Belichick’s agreement.

Working without a contract is not done in the NFL, where Belichick had only coached from 1975-2023. The league’s second-winningest coach trying his hand at the college game — at a time in which the transfer portal and NIL landscape have radically reshaped the sport — now remains a curious move, especially when four more coaching jobs opened up after Belichick and his lieutenants surveyed the NFL market during the season. The Cowboys, Jaguars and Raiders jobs have since opened, and Dallas connections persist.

Former Browns GM Michael Lombardi, who worked with Belichick in New England, is now the North Carolina football program’s GM. Lombardi denied any NFL interest exists, refuting the above-referenced report about Belichick’s thin staff creating some unease, and he responded to Jones’ report by indicating (via X) “the NFL isn’t an option” for the legendary HC. A report shortly after Belichick took the college job pegged him as being “disgusted” with a league that has been unwilling to grant him a third head coaching opportunity given the success he had in New England.

That said, Jonathan Jones notes that Belichick and Jerry Jones maintain a good relationship. Belichick was connected to monitoring the Cowboys job in 2024, and the Cowboys did backchannel work on him before deciding to retain Mike McCarthy last year. A report in the wake of McCarthy’s dismissal this week classified a Belichick-Cowboys partnership as one both sides would have been open to had the coach not jumped to the college ranks. Though, as we have mentioned many times, Belichick’s age (73 in April) poses a problem for him — as no HC older than 66 has ever been hired by an NFL team — and he ultimately opted to punt on a second carousel ride.

Bill Belichick also brought son Steve over from Washington to be his DC, a development that would further entrench the former in Chapel Hill, and ESPN.com’s Pete Thamel adds the Tar Heels have hired veteran NFL assistant Mike Priefer to be their special teams coordinator. Priefer had served as ST coordinator for the Chiefs, Broncos, Vikings and Browns from 2006-22. He last coached in college in 2001.