Patriots’ Personnel Decisions: Insider Expects Collaboration, Not Conflict
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Heading into April’s Draft, Patriots Executive Vice President of Personnel Eliot Wolf and his staff have been laying the groundwork since last fall for what will certainly be a critical draft in the coming months.
So far, it appears the Patriots won’t be making any drastic changes when it comes to Wolf, who is expected to remain in his current role for the immediate future. However, it does sound like he’ll have another smart mind joining New England’s staff. New York Giants personnel advisor Ryan Cowden, who worked with new head coach Mike Vrabel in Tennessee, is expected to join the club.
Some have wondered how that new dynamic might work out, but Greg Bedard of The Boston Sports Journal said on Sunday that he feels the key to this is the fact that Vrabel will be the one with final say when it comes to personnel decisions and he doesn’t expect this to have an adverse effect on Wolf’s situation.
“From what I understand, and this was sort of like during the negotiating process with Vrabel, and I don’t know where it came out, and we’ll be trying to find that out in the next couple of days,” said Bedard. “Regardless of what Kraft says [today], what Vrabel says about final say and things like that, I wouldn’t be surprised if they talked around it, and then we press Robert a little bit more at the league meetings, I think that Vrabel is going to have the final say on everything.”
“I think they’re going to go to a strong head coach model, and I think that’s going to be Vrabel. And as far as, you know, Ryan Cowden reportedly coming in, from Charles Robinson of Yahoo, and Eliot Wolf, these are the way things typically go in the NFL. And there’s a bunch of different reasons and people handle it differently, but I don’t think it’s a big deal. It’s just like I didn’t think it was a big deal when Robert Kraft said that Eliot Wolf is going to stay on. And of course, everybody reacted and got all out of their heads. I don’t think it’s a big deal. I think that Eliott Wolf, especially when you’re dealing with a guy like Eliot Wolf, who really works well with people, has been a number two in different places, I think they will figure it out.”
“And at the end of the day, I think that Vrabel is going to listen to everybody, and I think that largely the front office is going to stay intact, which I don’t have an issue with. You know, we’ll see with, I don’t really have an opinion on Matt Groh, but I know, like Eliot Wolf, Alonzo Highsmith, Pat Stewart, all those guys have been around the league. They’re experienced, they’re qualified for their jobs, and they would be great people to have in your personnel department.”
While Vrabel might be the one who has final say, Bedard believes that when it comes down to making personnel decisions, it will likely be a group decision by everyone in that department. He feels that Cowden will likely just be another smart mind during the evaluation process, which should hopefully yield better results moving forward.
“I think at the end of the day, when the Patriots make these decisions, it’s going to be a group,” said Bedard. “Mike’s going to listen to everybody. He might lean on Ryan Cowden a little bit more, but that doesn’t mean that there’s dysfunction or there’s an issue. I think they can figure it out. They’re all professionals.”
“That’s the biggest thing. All of these guys are professionals, experienced, from Vrabel to Cowden to Wolf to Highsmith, Pat Stewart, these guys are professionals. They can figure it out and get the job done for the New England Patriots.
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