This has been a strange hiring season in a lot of ways. Six teams needed new GMs (Broncos, Lions, Falcons, Jaguars, Panthers and Texans). The Broncos hired Paton (despite questions about Elway’s role). The Texans hired Nick Caserio without consulting their hiring firm or players. The Panthers hires Scott Fitterer from Seattle but they have an expensive coach in place. The Falcons hired a coach without a GM in place (rumor is the Saints Terry Fontenot but he isn’t hired yet). The Jaguars hired college coach UM so a GM will be a figurehead mostly. I think Washington is looking for a GM still? They have their coach in place so like the Panthers the WFT has a coach but no GM.
That is kind of crazy. A lot of former GMs sit without a job right now including Rick Smith (a guy I really liked), Thomas Dimitroff, Scott Pioli and so on.
In terms of coaches, the Jets hired Robert Saleh, the Jaguars get UM (defacto GM too I think) and the Falcons got Arthur Smith (with no GM formerly in place).
The Texans, Lions, Chargers and now Eagles are still looking for coaches. The Falcons and Washington FT are still looking for a GM.
That is a LOT of work but weird in how different each GM and coaching job really is.
What does this say about the Lions? Hard to say but many names the Lions talked to have not been hired by anyone else as a GM. Thomas D., Scott P. and Rick Smith come to mind.
There is a Brad Holmes connection to the Rams Bradley Staley, the Lions are connected to Dan Campbell and who knows what else is on going? This has been a crazy year.
My guess is the Lions liked Paton but the Broncos scooped him up and we hired Holmes shortly after that signaling maybe we liked Paton and liked Holmes and didn’t want to miss out on hiring Brad?
Just weird stuff with teams making strange decisions.