Michael Lombardi resigned as UNC football's highest-paid college GM amid an ongoing internal investigation, weeks into Bill Belichick's second season.
Page S2From§Eachthe late evening edition — 3 September 2026
Lombardi's lawyer calls UNC probe a witch hunt days before it turns to Belichick's son
Hot Mic Moment
— get me political, somebody, because the University of North Carolina is running one internal investigation, opened over a complaint from a former employee, that pushed its own highest-paid athletic employee out the door, and that same internal investigation is now examining a drug allegation against the head coach's own son, all under one university's own roof. That is not two personnel matters. That is one institution investigating itself all the way up its own coaching staff, and somebody with a press badge for the state house should be asking how far self-review is supposed to reach before it reaches the top.
Gushis side
GUS: Michael Lombardi has resigned as general manager of North Carolina's football program, and by Fox News's own count he goes out as the highest-paid general manager in the National Football League — no small parting gift for a man who spent his career two steps behind Bill Belichick.
GUS: This reporter is given to understand the internal investigation that pushed Lombardi out sprang up suddenly this week, catching a blindsided front office flat on its heels.
GUS: And now, this reporter has learned, the very same probe has turned its attention to Steve Belichick, younger brother of the head coach, over allegations of drug use — a family affair, if this column has ever seen one.
GUS: Which leaves this column with a plain problem of sequence: a lawyer stands up in late August and calls the whole investigation a witch hunt, and by the following week the hunt has simply changed direction, from the highest-paid man in the building to the head coach's own kid.
Trudyher side
Fox News, September 4th, says "highest-paid college GM," Gus. College. As in Chapel Hill, as in the ACC, as in a league that does not hand out Lombardi Trophies. Bill's the one with the rings; his sidekick just collected a box from his desk.
Nothing about this sprang up. The New York Post had Lombardi on paid leave since late July over a former employee's complaint, and his own lawyer was already calling the probe a "witch hunt" on August 29th — five days before Lombardi resigned on September 3rd. That's five weeks of runway, sugar, not a surprise landing.
Steve Belichick is Bill's son, not his brother — the New York Post has him by name in the story that broke this morning. Get the family tree right before you get the pitchforks out.
Gus, that mic's hot, and the outrage is earned even if the delivery isn't — the Post itself calls this an "investigation twist," one probe, one university, moving straight from a paid-leave employee to the head coach's own son, dated September 4th, no correction needed. Go lie down, sugar, and let a grown woman finish the column.
“A lawyer stands up and hollers "witch hunt," and a week later the same broom sweeps up the head coach's own son — that's not persecution, pal, that's a university covering every desk in the building at once. They pay the GM more than the professors and investigate him with the same office that signs his paycheck; nobody outside ever gets a look at the ledger. Kid on the roster still can't cash a check, but there's apparently plenty of money for the guy running the front office.”
“Look, an internal investigation just means the university takes this seriously enough to handle it in-house — did I say "handle it in-house," that's not — what I mean is due process, full stop, and if it happens to touch the head coach's own family that just proves nobody's getting special treatment here. The witch hunt comment? Lawyers say things. That's what lawyers are for.”
The receipts
If Bill Belichick was hoping to have a controversy-free second season at the helm of North Carolina’s football program, he'd better think again.
The attorney for Michael Lombardi, Bill Belichick’s longtime right-hand man, says a “witch hunt” is happening on Tobacco Road.
Lombardi had been on paid leave since late July amid an internal investigation into a complaint from a former front office employee.
This page is a back-issue: the story as it ran, receipts as they were. The current edition is at the front.