Category Archives: Scouts

Here’s an Update on Where NFL Front Office Vacancies Are

16 Friday May 2025

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The one question I get this time of year is, where are there jobs open? So maybe I can save myself a couple texts by publishing this rundown of not only where the openings are but my guesses on how the jobs will be filled. I hope you find it helpful.

Executive level (Director of College/Pro Scouting and up)

  • I don’t think the Jaguars are done yet. I”m still in the dark on what’s next, but it seems like they have a long way to go to make their front office resemble the Rams.
  • Speaking of the Rams, they’re down a Senior Personnel Executive due to the loss of Brian Xanders to Jacksonville.
  • Most of the executive-level vacancies with the Jets have been filled. I haven’t heard of any big names getting ready to go to the Big Apple.
  • The Eagles are missing a Senior Director of College Scouting and a Senior Director of Scouting (Anthony Patch and Brandon Hunt, respectively, both gone to Las Vegas). My guess is that they stay in-house to replace them both. I’ve heard Assistant Director of College Scouting Ryan Myers is being elevated to director, for what it’s worth.
  • With the Patch and Hunt additions, in addition to the previous additions, I suspect the Raiders are done.
  • I expect movement on the pro side in Tennessee, but I don’t know what form that will take. I’m not sure if the team will have a pro director, or if the team’s pro scouts will work under someone at the executive level. New AGM Dave Ziegler has an extensive background on the pro side.
  • The Patriots lost their college director this week (Camren Williams).

Road level (National/College/Area/Pro Scout)

  • The Dolphins surprisingly said goodbye to Senior Scout Jim Abrams early in the post-draft process. He still hasn’t been replaced.
  • These are truly weird days because, based on what I’ve heard, the eternally frugal Bengals are replacing one loss (Christian Sarkisian to Northwestern) with not one, but two, hires.
  • I think the Giants are going to stay at two National Scouts since saying goodbye to Mike Derice.
  • If what happens in Jacksonville turns out to be what I expect to happen, there could be a lot of Jaguars scouts who could be on the way out. When/if that happens, I don’t expect them to be replaced. The only thing that could make this plan go awry is that the team has several area scouts with a year left on their respective contracts, and Jax has a reputation for preferring not to let scouts go if their respective contracts are not up.
  • On the pro side, the Rams tend to run pretty lean, so I don’t think either of the Pro Scouts no longer with the Jags (Geep Chryst and Chris Ash) will be replaced. Technically, they’ve already moved Rory Segrest into one of those slots (from the coaching side) already.
  • The sense I get is that former Rams National Scout Michael Pierce is “on the street” and doesn’t have an imminent new post. Between Michael, Derice and Abrams, there are some truly great scouts available right now. And those are just three names; there are many more whose reputation I don’t know as well.
  • Speaking of the Rams, though they do things a little differently, they did carry six area scouts last year. Right now, they have one (1), having either said goodbye to or promoted all six since mid-March. I don’t know exactly how they’ll address all of that, but I don’t think they have enough people in-house to find replacements around the office.
  • New England has a vacancy at Area Scout (Josh Hinch, though he’s soon to be announced as joining another team).
  • I could see movement with the Chargers, given second-year GM Joe Hortiz didn’t make a lot of changes a year ago. I’ve also heard many/most of the team’s scouts’ contracts are up. However, the team has had some pretty good drafts of late, so maybe Hortiz resists the impulse to bring in his own guys just for change’s sake.
  • I wouldn’t be surprised if the Packers or Falcons didn’t replace their recent losses. May be true of the Dolphins as well.
  • I think the Jets will replace Johnathon Stigall (Raiders) in-house. However, I know they’ve been interviewing aggressively and they’ll be bringing in at least one new Area Scout from the college ranks.

Scouting Assistant

  • This is where I expect the most change over the next month now that teams are filling in at higher levels.
  • The Eagles are pretty slim here (they have just two), which means, depending on how the dominoes fall, they may be aggressively looking for replacements soon. Typically, their model is to bring in 3-4 training camp interns and let them fight it out for the open scouting assistant positions, so we may not see clarity at that level in Philly for a while.
  • Looking at the Jaguars again, if GM James Gladstone wants to make his front office an exact duplicate of where he came from, I wouldn’t expect any hires, and maybe even some releases.
  • The Bucs just promoted two Scouting Assistants into more senior roles.
  • With Maya Ana Callender’s exit, the Patriots have a vacancy.
  • I’ve heard the Cardinals and Titans both recently made decisions on hires at this level.

For even more insider-level stuff on scouting, make sure to register for the Friday Wrap here.

Do NFL Scouting Additions Really Mean Anything?

01 Thursday May 2025

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These days, there’s a lot of movement in NFL front offices. That’s just the nature of the post-draft period. Once the picks are in, teams tend to reshape their scouting staffs, especially if there’s a new GM in town.

Often, changes in a team’s scouting lineup are met with great fanfare, especially when a struggling team starts turning the page on some of its longer-serving officials. But is this warranted? And is there any link between the scouts a team might add and their success on following draft days? It’s hard to tell, but here are my thoughts on what to look for when you see faces change in NFL front offices.

Awards and accomplishments: There’s no PFF for scouts. It’s very hard to know which ones are good and which ones just happened to be with good organizations. What’s more, we’re seeing, time and again, that some of the scouts who are most respected by their peers get let go anyway. Despite this, we launched the BART List Awards in 2022 to give scouts a chance to recognize the best of their brethren. Though it’s only been four years, if you know a scout won a BART List Award (as I always try to include in my posts, when relevant), you know that other active NFL scouts think he’s good. I think that carries weight, whether or not his team recognizes it or not.

Their previous organizations: The Lions’ turnaround started when they brought in Brad Holmes from the Rams as the new GM. These days, the Lions and the Rams are perennial playoff teams with outstanding leadership. Last year, new Commanders GM Adam Peters arrived from the 49ers and rebuilt the team’s front office with executives from the Lions (Assistant GM Lance Newmark), Ravens (Director of Player Personnel David Blackburn) and Seahawks (Personnel Executive Scott Fitterer, by way of the Panthers). All four of those organizations (San Francisco, Detroit, Baltimore and Seattle) are NFL bluebloods. Though those new additions (who all arrived in May or later) didn’t draft for Washington in 2024, obviously, I”m confident Peters’ staff is going to bear fruit quickly.

Look at who they are: The Raiders announced Wednesday that they’d be bringing in Johnathon Stigall as the team’s new Assistant Director of College Scouting, and the move drew raspberries from some on Twitter. Really? Here’s what you need to know about Johnathon:

  • He actually played the game at the college level as a running back at DePauw in the late 90s. Scouts who are ex-college players is becoming rare.
  • He has almost 30 years in NFL player evaluation (he’s entering his 27th year).
  • He’s worked for the late Tom Heckert (Browns), Howie Roseman (Eagles), Rick Spielman (Dolphins) and the late Mark Hatley (Bears). Those might not all be household names, but they are all highly respected in NFL circles. Trust me.
  • He was part of a Jets staff that drafted the OROY (Ohio State WO Garrett Wilson) AND the DROY (Cincinnati DC Sauce Gardner) in the same year (2022).
  • We’ve presented the BART List Award four years. He’s won three of them. We hand out 20-30 each year, so it’s not like he’s the one award winner, but it’s still impressive.

That’s a resume. If you’re a Raiders fan, you should feel really good about landing Johnathon. I can assure you new Jets GM Darren Mougey wasn’t happy to see him go.

It’s important to recognize that no team bats 1.000 in the draft. Shoot, if you bat .800 on Day 1 and Day 2 and .500 on Day 3, you’re almost guaranteed to be a perennial playoff team. But there are signs that some teams do it better than others, and I feel strongly that these are the best metrics as you follow along with the new additions during “scout hiring season.”

Here’s What I Learned While Writing Value Picks

17 Thursday Apr 2025

Posted by in ITL, NFL draft, Scouts

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I’ve said this a lot, maybe even in this space, but one of the best things about working in this game is that the learning never stops. That was especially true as I wrote my third (and latest) book, Value Picks, which is available on Amazon right now.

Here are a few things I gathered while putting the book together.

Few teams practice BPA: Every team likes to claim that it took the “best player on the board” at each turn, but that’s just not true. Numerous teams passed on Alabama’s Derrick Henry because they felt set at running back; credit to the Titans for taking him despite planning on making the recently acquired DeMarco Murray their bell cow in 2016. Several teams also overlooked Mississippi State’s Dak Prescott simply because they were set at QB. Not the Cowboys, who had a proven veteran in Tony Romo (though, admittedly, Romo was beset with injuries that eventually ended his career).

Workouts matter: There’s a segment of the scouting community that likes to laugh off the Combine as the “underwear Olympics.” However, as part of former Bears scout Chris Prescott’s chapter late in the book, he dismissed Florida LB Antonio Morrison as a fourth-round possibility because he “was a polarizing player who didn’t work out well.” On the other hand, he says of Texas Tech’s Jakeem Grant (who went 6/186 to the Dolphins) “I remember we didn’t really love him, then he pops whatever 40 time that was, and we kinda got on him late because of how fast he was.” As a receiver with iffy hands who didn’t return punts, if Grant goes out and runs a 4.4, he’s probably a UDFA who’s on a short leash in rookie camp. As it was, because he showed sub-4.2 speed in Lubbock at his pro day, he was given enough runway to develop into a second-team All-Pro in 2020.

Winning involves risk: I devoted a chapter to West Alabama’s Tyreek Hill, who had serious baggage entering the 2016 draft. Most teams wouldn’t touch him due to his character blemishes, but one did, Kansas City. I’d argue that they reaped considerable benefits from rolling the dice. On the other hand, the Saints got feedback from their sources at Ohio State that Michael Thomas could be difficult. Again, they rolled the dice, and for the first few seasons, they were big winners. Ultimately, however, his conduct became a problem. It’s arguable whether his actions outweighed his production, but they definitely got some negative along with the positive. Still, both teams were rewarded, to some degree, by taking a gamble.

Scouts are mostly right: A lot of people aren’t going to want to hear this, but scouts are right more often than not. Draft picks don’t fail in a vacuum. There are reasons some players lose their motivation when they make the money that comes with being an NFL draftee. However, maybe more often, they lose their effectiveness due to injury, multiple scheme changes/poor system fit, or other factors that go unnoticed. Usually, a player’s failing in the league were predicted somewhere in the reports filed by evaluators.

Sixteen Reasons Why ‘Value Picks’ Needs to Be on Your Reading List

10 Thursday Apr 2025

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This week, we’re launching my latest book, Value Picks: The Drama, Decisions and Details Behind Eight Selections in the 2016 NFL Draft.” It’s available in paperback, on Kindle, and on Audible here.

It’s a fun read, if I do say so myself. My original idea was to write a book about Ole Miss’ Laremy Tunsil and the Video Seen ‘Round the World, but as I dug into things, there were so many interesting stories that I had to expand my focus. There’s still plenty about Tunsil in there, but so much more, as well.

I thought I’d pick out 16 reasons why it’s worth putting on your bookshelf. Here goes.

  • Learn about the battle between North Dakota State’s Carson Wentz and Cal’s Jared Goff, and why the Rams ultimately chose Goff.
  • Find out how many teams truly saw both of them as first-rounders, and why (or why not).
  • Read scouts’ memories of what happened when the Tunsil video was played before the draft started.
  • Review which teams nearly rolled the dice on Tunsil before Miami finally took him at 13.
  • Learn why so many wide receivers were drafted before Ohio State’s Michael Thomas (and how they fared).
  • Discover which former NFL GM helped Cowboys owner Jerry Jones decide that Ohio State’s Ezekiel Elliott would be the pick at 4.
  • Break down the list of concerns teams had about Alabama’s Derrick Henry, and why Tennessee finally pulled his card despite having just traded for an every-down back.
  • Learn about the player comp that prompted Louisville’s Sheldon Rankins to go ahead of other defensive tackles like UCLA’s Kenny Clark, Mississippi State’s Chris Jones and South Carolina State’s Javon Hargrove.
  • Examine the Chiefs’ painstaking draft process that led them to choosing West Alabama’s Tyreek Hill despite his off-field issues, small-school pedigree and limited development while in college.
  • Find out which Bears scouting executive (and future NFL GM) was especially high on Mississippi State’s Dak Prescott.
  • Sort through the various quarterbacks the Cowboys tried to pick before “dumbing into” Prescott.
  • Follow the account of the devastating hit that might have secured West Virginia’s Karl Joseph as a first-round pick.
  • Laugh as you hear which Vikings pick gave the team fits for refusing to practice in socks.
  • Read what Minnesota scouts really thought about sixth-rounder Moritz Bohringer, the German who was the first-ever player drafted without playing college football.
  • Catch up on the account of Jakeem Grant’s sub-4.2 40 at Texas Tech’s pro day (and why his friends and family weren’t overly concerned when he was violently ill shortly afterwards).
  • Consider the disconnect among Browns staffers as team ownership pushed to make analytics a major part of the team’s decision-making.

This is my first book since Scout Speak came out in 2020, and if you enjoyed that one, you’ll love this one. I only write books that I would want to read myself, and this is one I’d order the first day it came out. Give it a shot. I think you’ll find it informative and entertaining.

Here’s My Advice to NFL Scouts Seeking College GM Jobs

21 Friday Mar 2025

Posted by in Getting started, NIL, Scouts, Transfer portal

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It started during all-star season, when a few scouting friends told me to keep them in mind if I heard of any college GM openings. It’s gotten busier lately as friends at two P4 schools asked for recommendations on filling a few openings. The pro-to-college pipeline is roaring, and it’s definitely got people on both sides of the divide talking.

It got me thinking about what kind of advice I’d give an NFL scout seeking to make the transition to college. Here are a few things to think about.

G5 schools are looking to hire people with high school contacts; P4 schools are seeking candidates with NFL ties: This should be fairly obvious. Though the bigger schools want to tout their NFL bona fides in the race to attract portal talent, mid-majors are still trying to develop high school talent. For that reason, it’s going to be harder to land jobs in the smaller conferences. Plan accordingly.

You better be relational: It’s not that scouts don’t want to talk to agents, or that they think they’re better than them or whatever. At the end of the day, however, being a good scout lends itself to independence and self-motivation. However, you’ve got to step outside your comfort zone, regularly, if you want to work in the college space, especially if most of your experience is in pro football.

Connections with agents are a plus: We filled the room with schools at our symposium on the Friday of the NFL Combine. I felt like we put together a good program, but there’s one reason why so many schools were represented. It’s because we had almost every major NIL agency represented there.

Have a decent understanding of the bigger financial picture: I get it. That’s not your problem. But you better understand that big-money hedge funds and deep-pocketed investors are moving into college football as they hope to get a piece of a school’s athletic department before the school makes a move to a major conference or lands a fat broadcast deal. Everything is changing so quickly that you risk professional suicide if you don’t see where things are going.

Don’t try to break the bank: Scout salaries are rising (slightly), but nowhere near the way they’re rising on the college side. I know the headlines promise lucrative salaries instantly, but if I’m an NFL scout who doesn’t have a clear path to GM in the NFL, I’d be willing to take one step back financially to take two forward, given the trends.

Get representation: The trend among scouts is to not seek an agent until you get to the director level. I think it’s wise to get an earlier start these days. It just gives you one more set of ears, and more often than not, these jobs get filled before they are even widely known as being available.

Don’t run away from a background in coaching: We are seeing fewer scouts who’ve been coaches over the past decade-plus. However, if you’re a scout who’s spent time on the field, I think the transition will be easier to the college game, where scouts do a lot more than just evaluating.

Three Emerging Football Trends I Could See

14 Friday Mar 2025

Posted by in Media, NIL, Scouts, Transfer portal

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Between the NFL Combine, my reading of a book called The Price, and conversations with people across college and pro football over the last two weeks, I’ve been doing a lot of thinking.

Here are three ideas that are coalescing in my head these days. I think they all could shift the direction of college and pro football over the next decade. Here goes . . . .

Fundraising, not player evaluation, will be football-playing schools’ highest responsibility: This week, UNLV’s athletic director admitted he hired a head coach without knowing how he’s going to pay him (before walking things back once it set off an Internet firestorm). That’s shocking. We’re seeing lots of GMs being hired lately with backgrounds in NFL scouting, but with donor fatigue at all-time highs, schools better have a plan for raising money.

The NFL will go from a partner of college football to a rival: Will the new enforcement rules begin to limit the money paid out to athletes for name, image and likeness? Will we see more collectives come under the roof of the school, like Colorado and UCF have done? I don’t know, and even if they do, I don’t know if that will curtail spending. Bottom line, college football is becoming more and more professional-looking, and you can’t deny the excellent quality of play. At some point, the dollars have to become limited, don’t they? Ultimately, college football teams don’t really need the NFL. Could college and pro football become contentious with each other? I don’t know. It’s possible.

Scouting will continue to become centralized: This week, the Rams, who were voted winners of the Best Draft Award for their work last April, announced new roles and titles for a dozen scouting staffers. Their new lineup includes six (6!) senior personnel executives — this title wasn’t even being used across the NFL until maybe five years ago — and one (1!) area scout. Does this mean they’re sending out one guy to make school visits in all 50 states? Of course not. However, it’s undeniable that (a) they are doing things differently and (b) they are having great success. We also learned this week that the Jaguars (with a new head coach and GM with Rams roots) will not hold a local pro day at team HQ next month. That’s another departure from most teams, but not the Rams, who never have one. If Jacksonville starts having success, other teams will start copying The Rams Way when it comes to the draft. That’s going to be a significant shift.

There’s a good reason to believe I’m crazy, and maybe none of these ideas will get traction. I really hope I’m wrong — maybe in five years, people will look at this post and laugh — but I fear I’m right. More discussion about the game is in today’s Friday Wrap. Register for it here.

Which New GM Has the Best Chances of Success Quickly?

14 Friday Feb 2025

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Your turn to play GM. Given the following, who would you want to be? Mike Borgonzi (Titans), John Spytek (Raiders), Darren Mougey (Jets) or the to-be-named Jacksonville GM? 

TITANS (3-14)

  • Day 1: Tennessee “earned” the top pick.
  • Picks: 8 (a first, a second, two fourths, two fifths, a sixth and a seventh)
  • Head coach: Brian Callahan enters Year 2; it’s hard to judge him, given the hand he’s been dealt.
  • QBs in 2024: Neither Will Levis or Mason Rudolph (who’s a free agent) would be the starter next season in a perfect world.
  • Division: The Texans went two rounds into the playoffs. The Colts barely missed the playoffs, and the Jaguars fired both their head coach and GM. The Texans probably bounce back next season, but the Colts are a question mark unless QB Anthony Richardson takes a big leap forward.

RAIDERS (4-13)

  • Day 1: Las Vegas has the sixth pick.
  • Picks: 10 (a first, a second, two thirds, a fourth, a fifth, three sixths and a seventh)
  • Head coach: Pete Carroll is a youthful 73, and has a history of success.
  • QBs in 2024: None of Gardner Minshew, Desmond Ridder or Aidan O’Donnell were the answer. 
  • Division: Stacked. The Chiefs went to the Super Bowl, and the Chargers (11-6) and Broncos (10-7) both made the playoffs. Plus, all three have QBs who are in their respective primes, or on the rise.

JAGUARS (4-13)

  • Day 1: Jacksonville holds the fifth pick in the draft.
  • Picks: 10 (a first, a second, two thirds, two fourths, a fifth, two sixths and a seventh)
  • Head coach: Liam Coen arrives fresh off his success in Tampa Bay, but the bigger issue is that, with Executive VP of Football Operations Tony Boselli around, the new GM will have to fight to be heard.
  • QB in 2024: Though he finished the season on injured reserve, the team has Trevor Lawrence on an extended deal. He probably hasn’t been the QB everyone thought he would be, but he’s clearly the class of these four teams. 
  • Division: As discussed earlier, the Titans are in turmoil and the Colts are unsettled under center, though the Texans underplayed in 2024 and should be better next season.

JETS (5-12)

  • Day 1: New York holds the seventh pick in the draft. 
  • Picks: Eight (a first, a second, a third, a fourth, two fifths and two sixths, but no seventh)
  • Head coach: Aaron Glenn comes to New York hoping to recreate the magic he was part of in Detroit.
  • QB in 2024: The Jets just cut their starter, Aaron Rodgers. 
  • Division: The Bills are among the best teams in the NFL. However, the Patriots are still a ways away and the Dolphins underachieved in 2024.  

Which one would you choose? Not an easy choice. To me, Spytek has the hardest job given his division. The command situation gives me pause in Jacksonville, despite having Lawrence around. That leaves the Jets and Titans. I think I lean toward the Jets given the promise of Glenn, along with three picks in the top 100 vs. just two for Tennessee. Tough call, though. 

Getting to Know New Jets GM Darren Mougey

06 Thursday Feb 2025

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With pieces on new GMs Mike Borgonzi (Tennessee) and John Spytek (Las Vegas) completed the last two weeks, we turned to Darren Mougey, who’s taken over the same role with the Jets. It was easy to get takes (all of them positive) on Mougey, who’s been aggressively reshaping New York’s front office in his first few weeks on the job.

Here’s what his colleagues said about “Moug” this week:

  • “Really very smart. That’s one thing that really stands out, and he’s a good person. These guys are kinda hard to find sometimes, that have the personality and also a football mind. I knew right off the bat he’d be where he is, because I’ve been around so many GMs. I think he encompasses what you need in a GM. First of all, he’s a good guy to keep things together, he’s fair, he’s a pleasant guy, and he’s all football. Very likeable. He doesn’t say much, he’s kinda on the quite side, but he’s all football and he’ll definitely make the Jets a better program.” 
  • “Moug, as he is known across the League, is highly respected among scouts and coaches. He is an incredible evaluator with many years of experience scouting and playing. He is extremely detail-oriented, efficient and organized, and uses a very thorough process in all of his work. His leadership traits will make him a great GM and he has the personality to click with anyone and everyone. (I) have no doubt that he will be very successful in this next step of his career leading the Jets.”
  • “Always a good day to do a school call with Moug. Really sharp, good evaluator, has strong opinions on players, always positive with school staffs, easy guy to connect with. He’s always willing to help out another scout if they needed anything. Never afraid to roll up his sleeves to get a job done.”
  • “If you know Moug, no one is surprised he got the job. He’s a great person that is detailed and never afraid of the work that needs to get done. But what really separates Moug is he is really good person and he truly loves the game of football.
    Working with him for (almost a decade), you could always trust that the work would get done with Moug, and he is fun to just sit down and talk ball with because he  has the confidence to answer questions but still has a low ego.” 

  • “I would say that he is extremely bright, very smart, and has a good eye for talent. He is (also) very adaptable from the standpoint of being able to relate with different types of people, and I think that stems from just his experience in football and sports and being around just different guys in the locker room. So he’s very relatable. People gravitate towards him. Great personality. I would also say that he’s somebody that I think would be a collaborative type of guy where he would take input from different people and respect that, but yet at the very end of the day would be the guy that would make the decision . . . he does not come across to me as like an authoritarian-type leader where you know it’s his way and not really taking a lot of input. I could just see him being like a guy that would encourage that kind of culture, a collaborative culture . . . I think he’s gonna do really well in the job. I think he’s a guy that’s gonna be decisive when it comes to . . . making decisions. It looks like he and (head coach Aaron Glenn) are putting together a pretty nice coaching staff, a nice mix of young guys and veteran guys, so . . . I think he’s gonna do a really good job in New York. I’m excited for him, for sure.”

Before we go, a fun fact: the 2015 Broncos scouting staff featured Assistant Director of College Scouting Adam Peters, National Scout John Spytek, and Mougey, who was then an area scout covering the Southwest. Within 10 years, all three of them would ascend to the GM chair with NFL teams. 

Want to learn which other teams are “breeding” future GMs? Make sure you’re reading the Friday Wrap, which comes out Fridays (duh) at 7:30 p.m. EST. Register for it here.

Getting to Know New Titans GM Mike Borgonzi

22 Wednesday Jan 2025

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At Inside the League, we try to partner with the scouts, executives and administrators who do the evaluation of NFL players, both on their way up and while they’re in the league. Part of that is keeping a close eye on what’s going on in NFL front offices, especially when it comes to the GM seat.

We’ve previously polled our sources on NFL staffs about previous GM hires (here’s our report on Arizona’s Monti Ossenfort and Tennessee’s Ran Carthon, here’s our report on former Raiders GM Dave Ziegler, and here’s our post on the three GMs hired prior to the 2022 season), and with a new face in Tennessee, we asked around about new Titans GM Mike Borgonzi. The response was overwhelming and immediate, and he comes back as a little reserved but even-tempered, progressive when he needs to be, and hard-working. Here’s what people who’ve worked with him told us. 

  • “Mike Borgonzi has a high academic and football IQ, as you might expect from a Brown University graduate. (He’s) relatively calm and reserved, but has a feel for reading a scout’s view and separating facts from opinions. Has a scout’s eye when identifying a players traits but utilizes analytics to compliment, support, or confirm.”
  • “Nice guy. Pro (scouting) history, has never done college. Collaboration guy from the (former Packers GM) Ron Wolf system. Middle-of-the-road type dude. Speaks when spoken to type, with a small circle.”
  • “A grinder from the bottom up. Really worked and matured each step he made up the later. Respected and listened to inside the building. More (aligned with) traditional scouting. He’s a trust-his-gut (guy), but not afraid to be collaborative. I’d classify him as more introverted, but he will open up.” 
  • “Borgo as a person is very soft-spoken. In (almost two decades) working with him, I don’t think I ever heard him raise his voice to anyone. Really good person. (Also,) a great family man. Somewhat of an introvert with a close and small circle of friends. Old-school in his eval process, but does listen to analytics to a point. Really listens and trust his scouting/personnel department and will collaborate with them.”
  • “Mike is a highly detailed evaluator. Sees the big picture from a team-building standpoint, and has a clear vision on what plays at high levels in the NFL for each position. Has an old school, come-to-work mindset, but has a great grasp and feel for integrating the new trends in analytics/player tracking, etc. Is collaborative in getting a full grasp of what other scouts see and listens, but has his view as an evaluator. He is probably a blend of both old and new age scouting, and is a great communicator throughout the entire building. Will be a great partner for the head coach and assistant coaches.” 

  • “I would acknowledge how impressed I have been with him and his growth as a professional over the last decade. I’ve known him to be someone that is curious and approachable, as well a leader that recognizes that this is a people business first. He and I have had many conversations over the years around optimizing process and procedure and placing a premium on context when it comes to informed decision-making. I appreciate the tactical application to a well-vetted strategy has been a consistent element of our discussions.”

  • “Mike is a great person. He is smart and hard-working. He will be a great leader because he will set the standard, allow his people to work, and value their input. He ascended the right way, was authentic, and was not a self-promoter, just a good worker that took the right steps.”

  • “Mike is a high-level evaluator. On top of that, he is a relationship-builder. Guys will want to show up and work for him. I imagine he will implement a similar collaborative model like he had in KC. Mike has a lot of experience and knows what plays on a 53-man roster. I expect him to have success in Tennessee.”

Best Draft Award 2024: Who Are the Contenders?

02 Thursday Jan 2025

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On Friday, we’ll kick off voting for the Best Draft Award for 2024. It will be the eighth year we’ve presented the award (in order, the Saints, Colts, 49ers, Bucs, Broncos, Seahawks and Lions have won it, going back to the 2017 trophy), and it’s usually a tight vote.

While we at Inside the League don’t have a vote — only active NFL scouts get one — we do have to determine the finalists, and that’s not an easy task. It’s a cliche, but even getting selected as a finalist is a big deal, and we always go back and forth on the best five teams (we even took more than five finalists in 2021 and 2024).

Anyway, our job now is to determine which five teams did best last April, and we’re struggling with the choices. Here are 12 teams that we think have a pretty strong case, along with their best picks/UDFA signings.

Who should we pick? Obviously, there are some pretty strong choices here. It’s something we take seriously; we’d never want to omit a team that might have a case for winning it.

49ers Puni, Dominick (3/86) Mustapha, Malik (4/124) Guerendo, Isaac (4/129)
Buccaneers Barton, Graham (1/26) Smith, Tykee (3/89) Irving, Bucky (4/125)
Chargers Alt, Joe (1/5) McConkey, Ladd (2/34) Still, Tarheeb (5/137)
Colts Latu, Laiatu (1/15) Goncalves, Matt (3/79) Bortolini, Tanor (4/117)
Commanders Daniels, Jayden (1/2) Sainristil, Mike (2/50)  
Eagles Mitchell, Quinyon (1/22) DeJean, Cooper (2/40)  
Giants Nabers, Malik (1/6) Nubin, Tyler (2/47) Phillips, Dru (3/70)
Packers Morgan, Jordan (1/25) Cooper, Edgerrin (2/45) Bullard, Javon (2/58)
Panthers Legette, Xavier (1/32) Wallace, Trevin (3/72) Sanders, Ja’Tavion (4/101)
Raiders Bowers, Brock (1/13) Powers-Johnson, Jackson (2/44)  
Rams Verse, Jared (1/19) Fiske, Braden (2/39) Kinchens, Kam (3/99)
Steelers Frazier, Zach (2/51) Wilson, Payton (3/98) McCormick, Mason (4/119)

The conflict I struggle with every year is figuring out what’s better: one or two true impact players, or several players that contribute? My impression is that scouts value really hitting on Day 1 and Day 2, based on previous voting, though the award has been a funny thing. For example, the Jets had both the OROY (WO Garrett Wilson) and the DROY (DC Ahmad Gardner) in the 2022 draft, yet the Seahawks (who drafted starters at both tackle positions plus OH Kenneth Walker and DC Tariq Woolen) took home the trophy.

DMs are open at @insidetheleague. To find out who we chose, check out tomorrow’s Friday Wrap. If you aren’t registered yet, do that here.