Bill Belichick takes another shot at Patriots owner Robert Kraft

It is no secret that the relationship between Bill Belichick and Robert Kraft has been strained since Belichick left the New England Patriots.

Belichick took an obvious shot at Kraft and the Patriots owner's son, Jonathan, who is the president of the team, during an interview with Ben Volin of the Boston Globe that was published on Thursday.

Belichick is preparing for his first-ever season as a college coach with North Carolina. When asked what he has noticed that is different about coaching in college versus the NFL, Belichick insinuated he has enjoyed not having to answer to any members of the Kraft family while doing his job in Chapel Hill.

"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 Volin. "It’s a lot of football, and there’s not much in your way.

"There’s no owner, there’s no owner’s son. 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."

Shots fired.

There is no way to interpret that other than a criticism of Robert and Jonathan Kraft. Had Belichick left it at not having to answer to a team owner, you could make the case that he was speaking generally about the NFL. The fact that he added in "owner's son" makes it obvious he was referring to his old bosses, as both Robert and Jonathan are hands-on with the Patriots.

Belichick is almost certainly bitter over the way his tenure in New England ended following the 2023 season. He coached the Patriots for 24 seasons and won six Super Bowls, so he likely felt he should have been given more time to turn things around in the post-Tom Brady era. The Kraft family preferred to move on after a 4-13 campaign.

Though Belichick insists he is solely focused on the upcoming UNC season, this is not the first time in recent months that he has gone out of his way to throw a jab at Robert Kraft.