Sure, Belichick is a one-of-a-kind coach who won six Super Bowls with the Patriots. But Klatt predicted that, going forward, more teams will try to mimic the Belichick-UNC/Sanders-Colorado model by looking to the professional ranks when hiring a head coach. “It used to be that college football was purely a relational business, and the best recruiters in the country were the ones that could form the best relationships quickly,” he told me. “Now with revenue sharing and N.I.L., college has become much more transactional, like the NFL. As the sport moves to a more transactional model, there’s going to be more room for people like Bill Belichick.”

Pate, however, said that it would be a mistake for colleges to rely too heavily on the pro ranks while hunting for their next coach. “College football is not like the NFL,” he said. “Yeah, they pay the players legally now, and that’s like the NFL. But in college football, you have to convince people to come play for you. And Belichick is older than any three of his players combined. That doesn’t mean the end of the world—Nick Saban was winning at a very high level into his 70s. But Nick Saban had spent a life in college athletics.”

Pate predicted that Belichick’s ceiling with UNC is six or seven wins per year—occasionally eight or nine. “But that’s not what the expectations are,” he said. “I think the expectations are that he’s got the magic formula, and they’re gonna be a playoff contender. I’d be surprised if that were the case.”

Klatt was slightly more optimistic. “Bill is going to have success,” he said. “I don’t know how quickly that success happens, but I absolutely think he’s going to have success. He’s too good of a coach, and he’s now operating in a transactional environment. His way of doing business can and will succeed.”

On ESPN’s D.T.C. app: “All the pay-TV providers will be under pressure to offer it soon to their authenticated customers. ESPN will differentiate its D.T.C. service enough with multiview, betting, personalization, and more feeds (think of the U.S. Open this week) that a habit will begin to form—and a high share of ESPN viewing will be on D.T.C. Then, come renewal time with each M.V.P.D., Disney will be able to raise the price on ESPN ‘linear.’ Sports fans will pay more to stay in the bundle since it will still be the best deal on the whole enchilada.” —A veteran media executive

More on ESPN D.T.C.: “It isn’t a matter of distributors training customers to use the apps. They’re already very familiar. The issue is that once the linear feed is available in the app, there’s no reason for the customer to ever view the linear channel again. The app experience is superior in every way to the linear channel, and will further accelerate the drain of ad dollars from the linear channels.” —A Varsity subscriber

On ESPN’s MLB deal: “It’s hard to argue that Jimmy Pitaro hasn’t cemented himself as Most Valuable Sports Business Executive of 2025. Meanwhile, Rob Manfred may have earned himself a Comeback Commissioner of the Year award by keeping baseball on America’s most dominant sports media platform. Now he can return to his preferred pastime of feuding with players and agents rather than wrangling with media executives over distribution deals.” —A sports business executive

See you tomorrow,
John