It’s been a busy week for The Sports Gossip Show. Hosts Charlotte Wilder and Madeline Hill announced they joined The Athletic earlier in the week and on Friday, they revealed they received a cold call from Bill Belichick’s girlfriend, Jordon Hudson, where she made an astonishing comparison for herself.
The Hudson revelation has been a bombshell – with the hosts sharing an insight into their conversations with the 24-year-old in a special episode of their podcast.
Wilder revealed that Hudson called her randomly on a Saturday night. After initially rejecting the call from an unknown number, she picked up and was greeted on the other end by ‘Jordon Hudson… the president of your universe.’
Wilder said that Hudson had ‘an edge to her voice’ and wanted to speak about their episode on the Miss Maine pageant.
In that episode, Wilder and Hill compared Hudson to Tree Paine – the publicist for international pop icon Taylor Swift.
‘She loved that we had said she is Bill Belichick’s Tree Paine … “because I am”. She said “everybody loved Bill’s media presence until they found out I was behind it.”‘
Fallout from Jordon Hudson’s cold call to a gossip podcast continues after a shock reveal
Madeline Hill (left) and Charlotte Wilder – hosts of ‘The Sports Gossip Show’ – revealed Hudson cold-called them in the first of a series of conversations about one episode of their podcast
Hudson even agreed with the host’s suggestion that she was Belichick’s equivalent to Tree Paine (R) – the long-time publicist and PR expert for international pop icon Taylor Swift (L)
Paine has been Swift’s publicist since 2014 – having helped lead the singer through multiple high-profile scandals and moments.
These include her feud with Kanye West and Kim Kardashian, the dispute over her masters with her former record label, Swift’s sexual assault trial against ex-radio host David Mueller, and numerous rumors about her romantic life.
Paine has been branded a ‘PR pitbull’ and a ‘power publicist’ – and has generated a cult following among ‘Swifties’ for her expert navigation in all things public relations.
Inversely, Hudson assumed the role of Belichick’s PR guru after his former ‘consigliere’ – Berj Najarian – left his role at the Patriots for Boston College.
Hudson’s handling of the media firestorm around her relationship with the coach, the infamously botched CBS Sunday Morning interview, inquiries into her role at the University of North Carolina, the businesses she runs, properties she owns, and personal details about her background and family were not dealt with the greatest finesse.
This led to the hire of Brandon Faber from the Chicago Bears in order to right the ship.
Hudson’s initial call to Wilder broke months worth of cover after that CBS interview and led to multiple days of discussions with the podcast hosts afterwards.
Wilder and Hill initially had hopes that Hudson would agree to appear on their show. But as the days passed by and calls went unreturned, they grew uncomfortable with how Hudson was handling things. They said the discussions felt ‘like a toxic relationship’.
Paine has been Swift’s publicist since 2014 and has navigated the pop star through choppy waters plenty of times in the course of their decade-plus long professional collaboration
Meanwhile, Hudson appears to have been replaced as Belichick’s PR boss after a rough spring and summer of constant scrutiny about her relationship, businesses, and role at UNC
‘There were three main questions she had and she is talking in circles, using a lot of legalese,’ Wilder and Hill said. ‘Words, sort of like her Instagram captions, word salady, not exactly the correct word for what she is trying to say.’
Then, when Hudson discovered the podcasters were signing a new contract with The Athletic, she was angry.
They explained: ‘We tell her (about The Athletic deal) and she is not pleased, she says The Athletic has been awful to me, doesn’t like the reporting. Says “I don’t want to make The Athletic any money”.
‘She got very hung up about that in other times. She is sort of obsessed with the legality of how her image can be used. It was something she was very fixated on. She wants intense control without understanding you will never have it.’
The Friday after Hudson’s unannounced Saturday evening call, the talks fell apart once and for all.
Wilder took a call from an irate Hudson that afternoon, and she was screaming at her.
‘There is a real edge to her voice this time,’ Wilder said. ‘She really starts, she’s yelling at me, she is crying, she said she finished the rest of the Miss Maine episode and said she didn’t like what we said.
‘I was like “what?”. I thought we were talking about the episode that you watched (in full) the whole time. Complete 180. We had a feeling there was this tension – waiting for the other shoe to drop.
The podcasters said Hudson’s tone veered from ‘friendly’ to having ‘an edge’ in their talks
‘This goes on for 13 minutes. I am shaking. I’ve had people yell at me before but because I thought we had built up some level of trust with her, it was incredibly jarring. When someone is yelling at you, you are like ‘Oh my God, what have I done?’ but we haven’t done anything.
‘Either she just finished the Miss Maine episode or she had already watched it and kind of wanted to yell at us the whole time. Or if she had watched it, she felt betrayed by people who in her heard were more than reporters. She was like “you have been so nice to my face this week, how can you say these things?”.
‘To call me, so upset, I was like “what are you doing?”. You want to save her from herself. She clearly doesn’t trust us anymore, we don’t trust her as a reliable narrator about herself.
Hill added: ‘At times it felt like she was much older, times where it felt like she was much younger… It seems like she’s mad at the world, wants it both ways.’
Wilder said that very early on in discussions about Hudson appearing on their show, she told her that if an appearance didn’t happen they would still discuss their phone calls in a subsequent episode.
Given Hudson was aware of how things would play out, it makes her final call to Wilder all the more puzzling.
The latest installment of Hudson’s erratic behavior is nothing short of nightmare timing for Belichick and UNC, with the eight-time winning Super Bowl coach stepping up his preparations for his team’s first game of the season on Monday, September 1.
But the talks ended with Hudson ‘yelling and crying’ over coverage of her beauty pageant
It shifts the spotlight right back onto his personal life – something he has never been able to deal with comfortably or authentically – at a time when football season should be his only talking point.
He has defended Hudson staunchly until now. It remains to be seen how he responds from here.
The podcasters added that Hudson gave little away about her boyfriend.
‘Anytime we asked her about Bill, she would deflect,’ they said. ‘We got no information about Bill, her role at UNC. She wouldn’t give us anything.’
