East Carolina DL transfer C.J. Mims signs with North Carolina, Bill Belichick

East Carolina transfer DL C.J. Mims has signed with North Carolina, On3’s Pete Nakos confirms. He’s among the first transfer additions for new head coach Bill Belichick. Mims was originally committed to Wake Forest as a transfer but pulled back his decision with the retirement of head coach Dave Clawson.

Mims was an impactful presence during his three seasons with East Carolina. After redshirting his freshman season in 2022, Mims played in 24 games the last two seasons. He made 37 tackles and six tackles for loss and forced two fumbles from his defensive line spot.

Mims came to ECU as a three-star prospect. He was the No. 1683 overall player in the 2022 class, according to the On3 Industry Ranking. He played high school football at West Craven (N.C.) High School.

Mims has two years of eligibility remaining.

Belichick’s new GM at UNC explained some of their outlook on the portal

The transfer portal has been a source of plenty of consternation among college football coaches, administrators and most involved with the sport. From the timing to the general lack of controls on the market, the yearly open season has changed the sport and caused plenty of re-imagining.

And it equally provides ample opportunity for those looking to be disruptive, like the new braintrust at the top of the North Carolina football program: Belichick and general manager Mike Lombardi. Speaking on “The Pat McAfee Show” in early December, a day after news broke that he and Belichick would be headed to Chapel Hill, Lombardi explained their outlook on the transfer portal.

“Well if you want to play for the greatest coach of all-time, and you want to be around a winning program, please enter the portal. We’ll take you,” Lombardi said. “We’re going to go through it deeply. This is an advertisement for it. We’re going to go deep into it because we’re going to rebuild the team and I think it’s important. I don’t think it’s just about — this is team building. This isn’t adding players. We’re going to systematically and strategically build a team the right way so that we have sustainable success so that you can compete at the highest level of college football. I think that’s really important.”

Lombardi also downplayed potential issues around the upcoming revenue sharing and effective salary cap coming down via the House settlement. All it takes to navigate that, Lombardi said, is a deft and experienced front-office type and a coach who knows there are two tracks of how players get paid, and only one involves the transfer portal.

“I think everybody makes too much about the cap,” Lombardi said. “Certainly the players deserve to get paid. But more into the cap, there’s two things that involve the cap: It involves how do we develop players to become good players and how do we pay the players that already are good players? So there’s two systems that are going on simultaneously.”

“And you need a head coach like Coach Belichick who understands that. Player development is the key to salary cap. We’ve seen this. The Jacksonville Jaguars have done this for years, they buy players, they haven’t won enough games. You’ve gotta develop your own players from within.”