Another Bill Belichick disciple gets booted from NFL after Patriots departure

The 2024 season will serve as the start of a new era for the New England Patriots. With a new head coach and a (likely) new franchise quarterback via the 2024 NFL Draft, the Patriots are looking to turn the page from the Bill Belichick era.

Belichick will go down as the greatest coach of all time but the end of his tenure in New England was rough. The greatest head coach of all time did not surround himself with good assistant coaches at the end of his tenure and that was a big reason for the team's lack of success.

One of those Belichick disciples who got a second chance on the Patriots' staff even though he may not have deserved it was Joe Judge. After failing hard as the head coach of the New York Giants, Judge returned to the Patriots in 2022 as an offensive assistant and quarterbacks coach. In 2023, he was the assistant head coach.

As one of Belichick's "guys", it was beyond clear that the Pats were going to move on from Judge with Belichick no longer in the fold. Now, according to On3's Zach Berry, Judge has been hired as an assistant coach on Lane Kiffin's staff at Ole Miss.

Joe Judge joining Ole Miss after leaving Patriots is an unanticipated twist

Judge got his starting career at the collegiate level and now returns to the NCAA after spending over a decade in the NFL. His two Patriots tenures amounted to 10 total years with the organization while he also spent an additional two years with the Giants.

Both Judge and Ole Miss head coach Lane Kiffin have coached for Alabama but not at the same time. The two do not have any coaching connection in the past, so it is interesting to see that this is the job that Judge took after getting the boot alongside Belichick.

Ole Miss fans will spin this as a great hire and to be fair, at the college level, it probably will be. Judge had success as a special teams coordinator and he has the attitude that will play well in college football.

But the fact of the matter is that Judge has not done enough as an assistant to get another NFL job. His head-coaching tenure was about as bad as it comes and him being part of the offensive staff that ruined Mac Jones is as damning as it gets.

With Matt Patricia currently unemployed after his one year with the Philadelphia Eagles, Josh McDaniels still unemployed after being fired by the Las Vegas Raiders and Bill O'Brien leaving the NFL to coach Boston College, it is not a great time for former Belichick coaches in the NFL.