Is Carolina doubling down on the PR mess that was created when it hired Bill Belichick?
UNC didn’t know what it was getting into when it hired Michael Lombardi to be the football program’s general manager in December 2024. It was a given he and Belichick would have a late start at the transfer portal and high school recruits, but the 4-8 record and on-field performance reflected a poor job of evaluating players. Now, with Lombardi having resigned, UNC is looking for a new general manager – but has hired a stand-in consultant who similarly has some questionable baggage.
Sean Magee, a vice president at the search firm ZRG Turnkey, is now “providing support for the general manager role” at UNC as Turnkey helps makes its hire. Although terms of his agreement and salary have not been disclosed to this point, Magee’s past is a little bit troubling. A former general manager at Michigan, he had already left for the NFL’s Chicago Bears when the sign stealing scandal erupted in October 2023, eventually ending with a massive show-cause penalty for then-head coach Jim Harbaugh and the banishment of staffer Connor Stalions for illegally scouting opponents.
Since Stalions had started stealing signs during the 2021 season, is it reasonable to assume that Magee knew something about it when he served as associate athletic director for football, overseeing offseason operations, player personnel and the program budget for four years from 2018-2022? His position alone is not evidence that he knew about or participated in the scheme. But he also was hired back to Michigan amid the brief Sherrone Moore era, which ended poorly, and wasn’t retained when the Wolverines brought in Kyle Whittingham. Why is UNC hiring a guy with this kind of background – and what will he actually be doing during his time “consulting” the program?
Turnkey conducts searches for college athletic departments, coaches and professional sports executives, most recently working with Carolina to complete the Michael Malone hire for men’s basketball. The company lists among its success stories elsewhere hires like Indiana football’s Curt Cignetti and Dusty May for Michigan men’s basketball. Such firms have been more prevalent in helping athletic directors find new coaches, especially when the programs’ seasons are ongoing. It is unclear at this point whether UNC Chancellor Lee Roberts and Athletic Director Steve Newmark will enlist more help to replace Lombardi – and possibly Belichick, when his guaranteed contract expires in 2027.
This move speaks to an important question of accountability. The university must decide who the new football GM reports to, who controls personnel and roster spending and who has the authority when the coach and GM disagree. Clearly, with the resignation of Lombardi and Belichick’s son Steve from the staff, the athletic director remains ultimately accountable for the football program. What authority will the new GM have to keep problems from recurring?
An interesting comparison is the hiring of UNC men’s basketball general manager Jim Tanner. Tanner was clearly not a package deal with then-head coach Hubert Davis, having joined the staff later in Hubert’s tenure and not following him out the door this spring. So far, the general manager has had mixed reviews from insiders who question his $1 million-plus income for helping to negotiate revenue share and NIL contracts with less involvement in actual recruiting. And it’s still not entirely clear how Tanner fits into the organizational chart of the men’s basketball program compared to the coaching staff.
Maybe bringing in Turnkey and Magee reflects the relative inexperience of Roberts and Newmark in college athletics, or it’s extra insurance that Belichick will not hire another crony or relative to fill out his staff. NBC’s Mike Florio raised a concern that UNC would not simply allow Belichick to hire someone else in what has become, clearly, a governance issue with Carolina football. But recruiting continues throughout the season and UNC is behind on refilling its roster, all with Belichick in charge and focused on delivering the wins he needs to save his job.
Other questions worth asking UNC are how much the search costs, what specific services are included by Turnkey, and why UNC’s athletic leadership cannot already perform those tasks internally? Those answers would help distinguish the necessary specialist service from an additional layer of administration. If Newmark is already working for Roberts, what additional value does an outside firm provide? And, crucially, who has the ultimate authority to decide Belichick’s future, given that his hiring was so dysfunctional between the athletic department and other university leaders?
So the overarching question remains: who is in charge?
Featured image by Brighton McConnell/Chapel Hill Media Group.
Art Chansky is a veteran journalist who has written ten books, including best-sellers “Game Changers,” “Blue Bloods,” and “The Dean’s List.” He has contributed to WCHL for decades, having made his first appearance as a student in 1971. His “Sports Notebook” commentary airs on 97.9 The Hill WCHL and his “Art’s Angle” opinion column runs weekly on Chapelboro during football and basketball seasons.Chapelboro.com does not charge subscription fees, and you can directly support our efforts in local journalism here. Want more of what you see on Chapelboro? Let us bring free local news and community information to you by signing up for our newsletter.
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