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Monti Ossenfort

2023 NFL General Manager Search Tracker

January 17th, 2023 at 4:35pm CST by Sam Robinson

So far this offseason, only two NFL presented general manager vacancies. The Cardinals and Titans have now each made their choices. If other teams decide to make GM changes, they’ll be added to this list. Here is the current breakdown:

Updated 1-17-23 (4:27pm CT)

Arizona Cardinals

Tennessee Titans

Cardinals Hire Monti Ossenfort As GM

January 16th, 2023 at 10:21pm CST by Adam La Rose

Not long after confirming that Steve Keim would no longer be involved in the organization, the Cardinals have found his replacement. Arizona is hiring Monti Ossenfort as their new general manager, reports Tom Pelissero of NFL Network (Twitter link). The move has been confirmed by a team announcement.

Ossenfort has two decades of experience in NFL front offices, including his most recent stint as the Titans’ director of player personnel. His work over that span made him a highly regarded candidate for GM openings either in Tennessee or elsewhere over several years, and he is now set to take over Arizona’s front office.

Ossenfort has a long background in scouting dating back to his time with the Patriots. He had an extended stay in New England beginning in 2006, and had worked his way up to the role of college scouting director by the time he moved on to the Titans. When the latter organization made the surprising move of firing Jon Robinson, he quickly became a name to watch with respect to potential successors, along with interim GM Ryan Cowden.

Indeed, both Ossenfort and Cowden were among the early interviewees for the full-time position in Nashville. For a time, that vacancy was the only one in the league, but Keim’s midseason leave of absence led to widespread speculation that Arizona would be in need of a new GM this offseason as well. In the immediate aftermath of head coach Kliff Kingsbury‘s firing, it was announced that Keim would also not be in the desert in 2023.

The Cardinals interviewed Ossenfort after meeting with a pair of internal candidates for the position, but owner Michael Bidwill will now turn outside the organization to lead its next chapter. Former Giants GM Jerry Reese was also in consideration for the job, but Ossenfort will now be tasked with leading an NFL front office for the first time in his career.

His first major task, of course, will be finding a successor to Kingsbury. Bidwill had made it clear that his preference was to find a GM before a new bench boss, so he and Ossenfort can turn their attention towards the HC search process. That will entail input from a number of high-profile players on the team, including quarterback Kyler Murray. Finding a candidate who feels well-suited to meshing with the dual-threat’s skillset will be pivotal, given the organization’s commitment to him this past summer.

“It was critically important for us to find the right person to lead us as general manager and there is no doubt in my mind that we have that in Monti Ossenfort,” Bidwill said in a statement. “He possesses every attribute of a successful GM – passion, leadership, intelligence, work ethic – and his extensive experience has clearly prepared him for this role. We could not be more thrilled to have Monti and his family joining the Cardinals.”

The Cardinals finished well below expectations in 2022, and currently hold the No. 3 pick in the upcoming draft. Long before that event begins, however, the team will need to address a number of roster decisions in free agency, while implementing significant changes both in the front office and on the sidelines. The first step in the process has now taken place.

Titans Begin General Manager Search; Eight Execs On Radar

January 9th, 2023 at 4:32pm CST by Sam Robinson

Weeks after their surprising ouster of longtime GM Jon Robinson, the Titans are attempting to line up a host of candidates as potential replacements. Tennessee has sent out eight interview summons — both to in-house and external candidates — for its top front office post.

Appearing on the radar for recent jobs outside the Titans organization, Robinson staffers Ryan Cowden and Monti Ossenfort will be considered for the position. The team will speak with its interim GM (Cowden) and director of player personnel (Ossenfort) soon, Ian Rapoport of NFL.com reports (on Twitter).

The Titans have also identified six outside candidates as well, with Rapoport adding the Browns and Bears’ assistant GMs — Glenn Cook and Ian Cunningham, respectively — are on Tennessee’s list. Both made the jump to the second-in-command tier in 2022, with the Browns promoting Cook and the Bears hiring Cunningham from Howie Roseman‘s staff — amid a run on Eagles execs — to pair with Ryan Poles.

With Cowden being named Robinson’s interim replacement and having the chance to pair with Mike Vrabel in overseeing the Titans’ roster, it would seem he has a leg up on Ossenfort. As such, it will be interesting to see if Ossenfort is with the team next season. But the Titans do want to see what the former Patriots exec brings to the table. The Titans hired Ossenfort from the Pats in 2020. Cowden came to Tennessee along with Robinson in 2016, trekking to Nashville after 16 years with Carolina. Both Cowden and Ossenfort have interviewed for other teams’ GM roles. Ossenfort was a Bears finalist last year, while Cowden met twice for the Steelers job.

49ers execs Adam Peters and Ran Carthon are also on the Titans’ list, while Rapoport adds (Twitter links) the team wants to interview Cardinals exec Quentin Harris. Bills senior director of pro personnel Malik Boyd is also on the Titans’ candidate list, Rapoport tweets. Considering the vaults the Bills and 49ers have made, both division champions will run the risk of losing front office talent. Harris, Arizona’s VP of player personnel, has been with the Cardinals for 15 years and is a candidate to become their next GM. The Cards also have Ossenfort, Peters, Carthon and Cunningham on their radar.

The 49ers lost one of their staffers, Martin Mayhew, in 2021, while the Bills lost longtime Brandon Beane right-hand man Joe Schoen last year. Schoen’s Giants success could benefit Boyd, a longtime Cardinals staffer who has been with the Bills since Beane’s arrival in 2017. The 49ers added Peters, John Lynch‘s assistant GM, from the Broncos that same year. Peters interviewed twice for the Giants job that went to Schoen last year and met twice with the Panthers in 2021. An NFL exec since 2008 who has been the 49ers’ pro personnel director since 2017, Carthon has also been on the GM interview circuit previously as well. He met with both the Giants and Steelers last year.

“We’ve been working on it for at least four weeks now,” Titans owner Amy Adams Strunk asaid of the GM search. “I’d like to have a GM as soon as possible, but we’re not going to rush the process just to get someone in as quickly as possible. The way we have it planned right now is we have two rounds, and we’re going to see where these interviews take us.”

The Titans fired Robinson midway through his seventh season, doing so despite signing him to an extension less than a year ago. Adams Strunk denied the A.J. Brown trade (and two-touchdown game against his former team) prompted the move, indicating she disapproved of Robinson’s roster construction. The Titans’ recent run of injuries factored in as well. The about-face makes this search more interesting, as does Vrabel’s entrenched presence within the organization.

Cardinals Request GM Interviews With Ian Cunningham, Ran Carthon, Adam Peters, Monti Ossenfort

January 9th, 2023 at 3:51pm CST by Adam La Rose

It was announced not long after the Kliff Kingsbury firing that the Cardinals would also be in need of a new general manager. Steve Keim has permanently stepped away from the team due to health-related reasons, meaning Arizona joins Tennessee as the only NFL clubs currently in need of a new leader in their front office.

Keim took an indefinite leave of absence in December, and it was reported days later that he and the team were expected to part ways. With that move now having been made official, the franchise is currently operating with vice president of player personnel Quentin Harris and vice president of pro personnel Adrian Wilson filing in on an interim basis.

Each of them has already been interviewed for the full-time position, though, owner Michael Bidwill said on Monday. He added that his preference would be to have a new GM in place prior to the team’s next head coaching hire, but that the opposite order would also not be an issue (Twitter link via team reporter Darren Urban). External candidates have begun to emerge alongside Harris and Wilson.

One of those is Bears assistant GM Ian Cunningham, who has had received a formal interview request from the Cardinals, per CBS Sports’ Jonathan Jones (on Twitter). He has also drawn the attention of the Titans in the early goings of their GM search, a testament to his continued rise through the ranks of various NFL front office positions during his career.

Cunningham began with the Ravens in 2013 as a scout, translating his time there into a move to Philadelphia in 2017. Over the course of his time with the Eagles, he worked his way up to the title of player personnel director. Most recently, he was hired by the Bears last January in another promotion, this time to assistant general manager.

In addition to Cunningham, the Cardinals wish to meet with Ran Carthon and Adam Peters, ESPN’s Adam Schefter tweets. Those two hold the titles of director of pro personnel and AGM, respectively, with the 49ers. Like Cunningham, they too have caught the eye of the Titans for their general manager vacancy. Carthon, 41, has served in his current role since 2017 after spending time in the front office with the Falcons and Rams.

Monti Ossenfort is also on the Cardinals’ radar, Tom Pelissero of NFL.com tweets. Ossenfort, a longtime Patriots exec who has been with the Titans since 2020, saw the team elevate Ryan Cowden to its interim GM post in the wake of Jon Robinson‘s firing. Interviewing for GM roles in the past, Ossenfort serves as Tennessee’s director of player personnel. Given the Cowden development and the Titans’ changing of the guard, it will be interesting to see if Ossenfort remains on staff ahead of the 2023 season.

Peters, meanwhile, has been an NFL executive for two decades, beginning with the Patriots and later, the Broncos. He joined the 49ers in 2017, working his way up from VP of player personnel to the assistant GM title last year. He was a finalist for the Giants’ GM job last winter, which ultimately went to Joe Schoen.

Seeking their first GM in a decade, the Cardinals will have plenty of options to consider before making a hire. On the head coach side of the situation, quarterback Kyler Murray will be involved in the search for Kingsbury’s successor (Twitter link via Johnny Venerable of the PHNX Cardinals Podcast). That could add a interesting element to Arizona’s offseason, one which will be busy in light of today’s events.

2022 NFL General Manager Search Tracker

May 18th, 2022 at 5:03pm CST by Sam Robinson

Along with the head coaches being fired, a few NFL teams are looking for new general managers. Listed below are the GM candidates that have been linked to each of the teams with vacancies, along with their current status.

If and when other teams decide to make GM changes, they’ll be added to this list. Here is the current breakdown:

Updated 5-24-22 (9:03pm CT)

Chicago Bears

Las Vegas Raiders

Minnesota Vikings

New York Giants

Pittsburgh Steelers

Latest On Bears’ GM Search

January 24th, 2022 at 8:41pm CST by Ben Levine

At least three finalists have emerged for the Bears GM gig. According to NFL Network’s Ian Rapoport (via Twitter), the organization has requested second interviews with Titans director of player personnel Monti Ossenfort and Patriots senior consultant Eliot Wolf. We previously learned that Chiefs director of player personnel Ryan Poles would also be getting a second interview. Colts director of college scouting Morocco Brown could also be a candidate for a second interview, per Rapoport.

[RELATED: Bears Request Second GM Interview With Ryan Poles]

Ossenfort has been the director of player personnel in Tennessee for the past two years. Prior to the Titans, he spent 17 seasons in the Patriots’ organization, acting as the director of college scouting in his last six years in New England.

Wolf started off as a pro personnel assistant in 2004 with the Packers, where his father, Ron Wolf, served as general manager. In eight years with the team, Eliot worked his way into the director of pro personnel role, which he held for three years. In his last two seasons in Green Bay, he spent time in the roles of director of player personnel and director of football operations. He left Wisconsin for the assistant general manager position in Cleveland before taking his current position as a senior consultant in New England.

Brown had a seven-year stint as the Bears assistant director of pro personnel. He’s served as a top executive in Indy for the past five years, with Brown earning credit for his draft evaluation. He interviewed for the Falcons GM gig last offseason.

Vikings Complete Ossenfort Interview Today

January 16th, 2022 at 7:13pm CST by Ely Allen

The Vikings announced today that they completed their interview of Titans’ director of player personnel Monti Ossenfort to fill their open general manager position.

The 43-year old actually began his NFL career in Minnesota, starting off as a training camp intern for the Vikings in 2001. The next season, Ossenfort joined the Texans’ organization as a pro personnel department intern. He spent the following season in New England as a personnel assistant before returning to Houston in the role of pro and college scouting assistant. He was promoted after a year to the position of college scout for the Texans. Ossenfort returned to New England the next year and stayed there until two seasons ago, spending his last six years with the Patriots as their director of college scouting. He’s been in his current position as the Titans’ director of player personnel since then.

Ossenfort is the first one of several candidates to interview for the Vikings’ job and he interviewed for the Giants’ and Bears’ positions on Friday and Saturday respectively. To stay up to date on all the different candidates for the open general manager jobs, follow along with our 2022 NFL General Manager Search Tracker.

Bears Interview Titans’ Monti Ossenfort

January 15th, 2022 at 11:15pm CST by Ely Allen

Today the Chicago Bears announced that they interviewed Monti Ossenfort for the their open general manager position. While not previously mentioned as a candidate for Chicago, Ossenfort has interviewed with the Giants and will interview with the Vikings tomorrow.

Ossenfort has been the director of player personnel in Tennessee for the past two years. Prior to the Titans, he spent 17 seasons in the Patriots’ organization, acting as the director of college scouting in his last six years in New England.

As far as we’ve seen, Ossenfort is the fifth candidate to interview for the open general manager position and Chicago has several other targets who have yet to interview. Follow the updates on all three open general manager positions on our 2022 NFL General Manager Search Tracker.

Vikings Make Four More GM Interview Requests

January 13th, 2022 at 4:05pm CST by Adam La Rose

4:04pm: More names are emerging on the Vikings’ fast-growing candidate list. The Vikings want to interview Titans director of player personnel Monti Ossenfort, Ben Goessling of the Minneapolis Star Tribune tweets. Ossenfort’s name has been tossed around for GM vacancies for a bit now, dating back to his time with the Patriots.

With the Titans since 2020, Ossenfort advanced to the second round of Panthers GM interviews last year. He also has a history with the Vikings. The Minnesota-Morris alum worked as a training camp intern with the Vikes in 2001, Goessling notes.

8:59am: It was reported overnight that another three names have been added to the Vikings’ list of general manager candidates. Two of them are from the Eagles, including one who represents a piece of NFL history.

According to ESPN’s Adam Schefter, the Vikings have put in a request to interview Eagles VP of football operations Catherine Raiche (Twitter link). That news is ground-breaking, as it is believed to be the first time a woman has been requested to be interviewed for a GM position. Schefter and others have noted that Susan Tose Spencer was the first female GM in NFL history, holding that title from 1983-85, but she was promoted internally to that role.

This doesn’t appear to be the first time that someone has shown interest in Raiche. Sports Illustrated’s Albert Breer notes in his annual GM preview that current Browns GM Andrew Berry tried to bring the 32-year-old with him when he left that same VP of football operations role to come to Cleveland. He adds that one of her former colleagues has stated “she will be the first female GM [hire]”. NFL Network’s Mike Garafolo notes that Raiche was promoted to her current position last year, following successful stints in the CFL and XFL which have helped her climb the executive ladder very quickly.

Garafolo also tweets that Eagles director of player personnel Brandon Brown has had an interview requested as well. Brown started full-time in an NFL front office with the Colts in 2015, then came to Philadelphia in 2017. He has spent the past five seasons with the Eagles, and was promoted to his current role – which includes work on both the pro and college scouting levels – in 2021.

Finally, Schefter tweets that the Vikings are requesting to interview Chiefs director of player personnel Ryan Poles. He has already been named as a candidate for the Giants’ open GM position, and was also linked to the Panthers for the same job last season. Poles has been with Kansas City since 2009, where he began as a scouting assistant, and has worked his way up to being a key member of the Chiefs’ font office.

These additions brings the total number of interview requests for the Vikings’ GM position to eight.

Giants Request Interviews With Seven Execs For GM Opening

January 10th, 2022 at 9:07pm CST by Ben Levine

9:07pm: We can add three more names to the list of Giants GM candidates, all via Peter Schrager of FOX Sports (Twitter links). The Cardinals have requested permission to speak with Cardinals Vice President of Pro Personnel (and former safety) Adrian Wilson, 49ers assistant GM Adam Peters, and 49ers Director of Player Personnel Ran Carthon.

6:38pm: We learned earlier today that Giants GM Dave Gettleman was calling it a career, opening a vacancy atop the organization’s front office. Well, the organization has already started requesting interviews with potential replacements. ESPN’s Adam Schefter reports (via Twitter) that the Giants requested an interview with Bills assistant GM Joe Schoen.

ESPN’s Field Yates tweets that the organization also requested an interview with Chiefs Executive Director of Player Personnel Ryan Poles, while Jonathan Jones of CBS Sports tweets that New York requested interviews with Titans VP of player personnel Ryan Cowden and Titans director of player personnel Monti Ossenfort. Poles will interview Thursday, Albert Breer of SI.com tweets.

[RELATED: Dave Gettleman Officially Announces Retirement]

Schoen is set to interview Wednesday, per SNY’s Ralph Vacchiano (on Twitter). Schoen has been with the Bills organization since 2017, and he’s played a major role in the organization’s recent rise in the AFC. Prior to his stint in Buffalo, Schoen spent almost a decade in Miami (when he was endorsed by Bill Parcells), evolving from a national scout into director of player personnel. The executive also had a stint with the Panthers, working his way up from an intern in the ticket office.

Poles was mentioned as a candidate for the Panthers GM job last offseason. The executive has spent much of his career with the Chiefs, working his way up from director of college scouting to executive director of player personnel, where he works alongside GM Brett Veach and assistant GM Mike Borgonzi.

Ossenfort was also a candidate for the Panthers GM gig. The executive previously worked in the Patriots front office before moving on to Tennessee. Cowden has been with the Titans for six years, and that followed an almost two-decade stint with the Panthers organization.

Meanwhile, while many assumed that Giants assistant GM Kevin Abrams would be an option for the top gig, Paul Schwartz of the New York Post tweets that the executive “is not considered to be a candidate.” However, Abrams is respected within the organization and could stick around under a new GM.

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