Though the new England patriots haven’t named a replacement for bill Belichick as the team’s general manager, it seems that a front-runner is emerging.
According to Ian rapoport of NFL network, director of scouting eliot wolf will be in charge of the personnel department, with responsibility for the 53-man roster working closely with jerod mayo. according to rapoport, college scouting will be handled by matt groh, the most likely gm role. Robert kraft asked if he would hire a gm: “we want to see what we have in house, look at what’s out there in the marketplace, and then do what we think is right.” on wednesday, new england announced alonzo highsmith, the former miami hurricanes general manager of football operations, to its staff department.
After many years in the NFL, highsmith spent the last two seasons with the hurricanes, serving as a senior personnel executive with the green bay packers (2012-17), cleveland browns vice president of player personnel (2018-19), and seattle seahawks personnel executive (2020-22). Belichick, who was new england’s de facto gm during his 24-year tenure with the team, had previously had the upper hand on the pats’ roster.
Bobby grier, the last official gm who didn’t serve as the head coach for the patriots from 1997-99, was the last time the team had an official gm. In fact, two of new england’s last three gms have dual roles as head coach.
Chuck fairbanks, the winningest gm in patriots franchise history, has a 41-31 record (.569 win percentage) from 1974-78, aside from belichick (.720 win percentage). Only two players aside from belichick have lasted longer than five seasons out of 14 gms in team history: pat sullivan (1983-90) and mike holovak (1961-68).
