Bill Belichick is truly bringing an NFL feel to North Carolina football. The former longtime New England Patriots head coach now has a general manager for his college program in Chapel Hill, North Carolina.
Belichick, who became the Tar Heels head coach in December, also brought in former Cleveland Browns general manager Michael Lombardi for the same role at the University of North Carolina (UNC). The two worked together in New England when Lombardi served as an assistant for the coaching staff between 2014 and 2016.
Of course, college football has seen some pro-like aspects in receiving years with the name, image, and likeness (NIL) business opportunities for student-athletes.
In addition, student-athletes can change programs more easily than ever before with the transfer portal, which can have a similar feel to free agency in the NFL.
College football also has a potentially longer season for teams that make the playoffs than in the past—between 13 and 17 games.
“Football is challenging. I think coach Belichick would be better to speak about this. There’s a lot of things that go into building a team, and there is a lot of areas,” Lombardi said.
“Sometimes when money’s involved—because, let’s be honest, money’s involved now—you have to have a subjective way of determining how to handle the money and how to place a value on it, and you have to remove bias.
“I think that’s the biggest challenge in pro football, is there’s bias built in internally in terms of—I want this player; I want that player,” Lombardi continued.
“Somebody has to be the voice of saying, well, we can find an alternative here, and maybe we can’t. I think team-building requires more than just one person. In the day when I first started in the league, it didn’t because we didn’t have much player movement, much volatility. Now there is in all levels.”
Lombardi emphasized that building a team in the trenches on the offensive and defensive lines is a high priority—similar to his experience in the NFL. A former scout or executive in the league from 1984 to 2016, Lombardi has a wealth of experience including his time with three Super Bowl teams in that span.
“The great thing about football is you can study winning on any level, and there’s a formula for why teams win and why teams lose,” Lombardi said.
“And if you pay close attention to it, it’s not that difficult,” he said.
“Football, going back to when (Vince) Lombardi coached the Packers in the ‘60s, to when Bill (Parcells) coached the Giants, or Bill Walsh coached the 49ers, it’s about who wins the line, who controls the game.”
“Part of our job is to explain who we are and what we’re doing,” Lombardi said. “That’s what the fans want to know, and they want to know what their program is because they want to stand next to somebody and say they’re building this in North Carolina, and they want to say it with authority,” he said
“And so that’s my job, that’s coach Belichick’s job is to keep echoing those comments. And I think once you get people to buy into your plan and you explain it —the second area of leadership is called management of meeting—you get people to follow you.”
