Bill Belichick has many more paths to failure than success at North Carolina

Bill Belichick was introduced as North Carolina's new head coach on Thursday at a press conference, in what might be the most surprising hire in recent memory.

Belichick, the architect of the Patriots 20-year dynasty, is one of the greatest coaches in NFL history. But the fact of the matter remains that there are far more ways he can fail in college than there are for him to succeed.

Yes, we've all heard about the 400-page manifesto that Belichick delivered to the Tar Heels' athletic department outlining how he wants the program to be run. And yes, there's no denying Belichick's pedigree at coaching in the NFL; no coach has achieved the level of success he did, for as long as he did.

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But this isn't the NFL. College football is its own unique animal, with its own quirks, its own issues, and its own potential failure points. And unfortunately for Belichick, many of those failure points are going to require him to change the way he's operated for most of his career.

In the NFL, you're beholden to one person, and one person only: the team's owner. If they're happy, you're good. In college, though, there's a whole group of people you have to keep happy: the boosters. Every major college program has them, and they are in most cases the de facto power brokers of their school's football program.

Belichick is notoriously prickly and secretive about his teams. He's never given off the vibe of someone who can gladhand and make nice with car dealership owners and rich bankers from Charlotte, and the first time any of them make suggestions or demands of him it's going to end catastrophically.

If you can't make nice with the boosters, you don't get the money you need, and if you don't get the money you need, you won't win. And if you don't win, those boosters who you've fumbled will turn on you in a snap.

We've seen what happens when people try and do the Belichick act in college; remember Charlie Weis? Belichick's former offensive coordinator came to Notre Dame preaching about a "schematic advantage" for the Irish, but failed to impress the booster corps and was gone after five seasons, before landing at Kansas and driving that program so far into the earth that they're still digging out from the wreckage.

But what about the players? Belichick has talked about wanting to build an NFL pipeline in Chapel Hill, a place where guys who have dreams of going pro can go and learn what they need to succeed at the next level. Sounds pretty great, right?

Well, unfortunately for Bill, those pipelines already exist, and work pretty well. You can find them at Alabama, at Georgia, at Ohio State and Texas. Virtually every blue blooded college football powerhouse has shown they can develop stars for the next level. So why does your NFL experience make you any different? What do you offer to these kids that they can't get at Texas, or Ohio State, or even just down the road at Clemson?

Sure, Belichick's name offers some cachet, and sure, that will likely get a couple recruits early on. But this isn't 2010, or even 2015; NIL is here, the House settlement is here, and players are going to want to be paid a fair wage for their services. And when it comes to paying players, Belichick doesn't exactly have the best track record. The Patriots were infamous bargain hunters, eager to maximize players while paying as little as possible for their services. When they asked for more money? The door is right there.

College football doesn't work like that. You need top tier players to compete at the highest level, and sometimes, that means paying them what they want. You can find success bargain hunting, looking for diamonds in the rough, but at the end of the day you need the athletes to compete. And the teams at the top are all fighting over those same guys. The "Patriot Way" worked in the NFL, but in college, it's a great way to wind up 7-5 with a team full of wide receivers who get bossed around by Clemson's defensive backs.

Maybe the setup will change soon (although if they're waiting for Congress' legislation I wouldn't hold my breath), but right now if a player doesn't like how they're being used, they can just leave, and usually do. Sometimes you have to make concessions to keep players happy and in the program, and that might mean paying them more.

Not to mention, these are kids you're dealing with, not the fully-grown adults you have in the NFL. You have to allow for mistakes occasionally, expect that they're not going to immediately know how things are done, and have the patience to actually teach them. Will Belichick have it? If he doesn't, this will go sideways in a big hurry.

That's not to say that it can't work. Maybe Belichick is committed, maybe he's willing to learn and adjust the way he's done things. Maybe he's secretly been charming and funny and gregarious his entire career, and has just been waiting to unleash his charisma in Chapel Hill. Maybe he'll show the kind of patience he never had in the NFL, and a willingness to deal with the occasionally absurd demands of student athletes.

If he can navigate those waters, than the 73-year-old coaching legend can make this work for the Tar Heels. If he can't or just chooses not to? Then this could end up setting a program that's already in a precarious position back even further.

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