Bill Belichick’s friends fear Patriots head coach is on the hot seat entering 2023, per report

The idea that the Patriots would show Bill Belichick the door and fire arguably the greatest coach of all time, on its face, sounds preposterous. However, it may be more realistic than you think. In a column by The Boston Globe’s Ben Volin published on Tuesday highlighting how tightly knit Mac Jones appears to be with Robert Kraft and his camp, there was a nugget that seemed to reveal a crack in this two-decade-plus foundation spearheaded by the hooded head coach. 

Volin wrote that “Belichick’s friends have privately said they are worried that he is on the hot seat in 2023.”

In the aftermath of Tom Brady departing to Tampa Bay in the spring of 2020, New England has fallen off as a perennial Super Bowl contender. Over the past three seasons, Belichick’s team has gone 25-25 over the course of the regular season and failed to make the playoffs twice. In the lone season the Patriots did get back to the postseason (2021), they were swiftly kicked into the offseason by way of a 47-17 thumping by the Buffalo Bills in the wild card round. 

While those marks tell the story on a macro level, there have also been other issues that have arisen over the past few seasons. After a 7-9 season in 2020 in the first season post-Brady, the Patriots did seem to land on their feet after selecting Jones in the first round of the 2021 draft. Even as they were blown out by Buffalo in the playoffs that year, it did appear as if the arrow was pointing back up now that they had a capable young quarterback to build around. 

Well, the 2022 season had the team moving backward, largely due to the unorthodox decision by Belichick to hand the keys to the offense over to Matt Patricia, who primarily came up through the coaching ranks on the defensive side of the ball and had zero offensive play-calling experience. As you may expect, that led to insufficient play by the unit last season where it had the worst red zone offense in the league and sixth-lowest conversion rate on third down. As for Jones, he also regressed following a promising rookie season. 

It’s that type of regression that will get an owner rethinking his approach regardless of who he has at the helm. Already, we may have seen Kraft possibly have a heavier hand in New England’s operation after the team made an unprecedented statement earlier this offseason that said they were extending linebackers coach Jerod Mayo and interviewing offensive coordinator candidates, which ultimately led to the hiring of Bill O’Brien. 

“Look, I think Bill is exceptional at what he does. And I’ve given him the freedom to make the choices and do the things that need to be done,” Kraft told NFL Media at the Annual League Meeting back in March. “His football intellect and knowledge is unparalleled from what I’ve seen, and when you talk to him, the small things analytically that he looks at.

“But in the end, this is a business. You either execute and win, or you don’t. That’s where we’re at. I think we’re in a transition phase. I think we’ve made some moves this year, that I personally am comfortable with, and I still believe in Bill.”

The 2023 season will certainly be a pivotal one for Belichick and the Patriots and if they don’t show Kraft that things are pointing in the proper direction — and that’s toward a seventh Super Bowl for the franchise — it will be fascinating how he deals with arguably the most important figure (alongside Brady) in the franchise’s history.