Bill Belichick Seemingly Shades Patriots' Robert, Jonathan Kraft Ahead of UNC Debut

Bill Belichick appeared to take a jab at New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft and his son, team president Jonathan Kraft, while preparing to make his debut as North Carolina's head coach.

"It's a much more cohesive, and I'd say unified, view of what we're trying to do and how we're trying to do it," Belichick told Ben Volin of The Boston Globe (h/t SI.com's Mike Kadlick). "It's a lot of football, and there's not much in your way."

"There's no owner, there's no owner's son," he added. "There's no cap, everything that goes with the marketing and everything else, which I'm all for that. But it's way less of what it was at that level."

Belichick concluded his legendary run as New England's head coach at the end of the 2023 season before joining the Tar Heels in Dec. 2024.

While the Patriots were immensely successful throughout Belichick and Kraft's shared tenure, winning six Super Bowls, there was reportedly friction between the two throughout the head coach's final year with the team.

At the end of a 4-13 season in 2023, Belichick and New England mutually agreed to part ways.

Belichick went on to interview for the Atlanta Falcons' head coaching vacancy in Jan. 2024, but ultimately didn't land the job.

ESPN's Don Van Natta Jr., Seth Wickersham and Jeremy Fowler reported that Robert Kraft talked to Falcons owner Arthur Blank during the hiring process and warned him "not to trust Bill."

Belichick also recently disagreed with the elder Kraft claiming he took a risk by hiring him as head coach in 1999.

"As I told Robert multiple times through the years, I took a big risk by taking the New England Patriots head coaching job," Belichick told Van Natta in July. "I already had an opportunity to be the head coach of the New York Jets, but the ownership situation was unstable."

As the coach prepares for his inaugural season with North Carolina, there still seems to be some tension between himself and the Kraft family.

In the meantime, the Tar Heels will kick off their 2025 campaign against TCU on Sept. 1.