Despite the team’s recent struggles, New England Patriots employees are still well sought out by other NFL teams and now the Patriots are losing one of the key pieces in their organization.
On Tuesday night, according to multiple reports, the Houston Texans came to an agreement with Patriots director of player personnel Nick Caserio to become their next general manager. The news comes after Caserio, 45, interviewed with both Houston and the Carolina Panthers for the front office position.
Caserio’s connection in Houston is to Jack Easterby, the Patriots’ former character coach who is the Texans’ vice president of football operations.
This isn’t the first time Caserio has been connected to the Texans’ job. Last summer, Houston reportedly wanted to hire Caserio as its GM. However, the Patriots threatened to file tampering charges against the Texans and Houston dropped its pursuit. At the time, Caserio had a clause in his contact that said he couldn’t interview with another team. This past year, the NFL made a rule saying teams couldn’t put that close in an employee’s contract if he had a chance to move up.
So now, Houston gets its man and the Patriots lose an important piece.
Caserio came to the Patriots in 2001 as a personnel assistant. He worked in all areas in the organization, including coaching (offensive assistant in 2002 and as the receivers coach in 2007). After serving as an area scout in 2003, he became the Director of Pro Personnel from 2004-2006 and then the Director of Player Personnel in 2008. He’s been a part of all six Super Bowl championships in New England.
Although Coach Bill Belichick has final authority on all moves, it’s been Caserio’s job to find players to sign, trade for and draft in New England. Caserio’s role also expanded beyond the front office. He helped at practice, which is a rarity for front-office personnel. Caserio was also wired into offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels’ headset for every game, where he told the coach the down and distance on each play.
In 2019, Belichick said, “Nick does a great job. He does a lot of different things for us. I’m sure he does more than anybody in the league at his position in terms of his interaction with the team, the coaching staff and the college and pro scouting. He’s involved in a lot of different things and does a great job at all of them. His job description would be several pages.”
Caserio’s exit leaves big shoes to fill within the Patriots’ organization. One internal option to replace him would be Assistant Director of Player Personnel Dave Ziegler, however, the Denver Broncos have requested permission to interview Ziegler for their vacant GM job, according to ESPN.
If Ziegler doesn’t end up in Denver, he would be a natural replacement for Caserio. However, there are ties to Denver as Ziegler came to the Patriots from the Broncos. He’s been in New England for the last eight seasons. He spent three seasons as the assistant director of pro scouting, four seasons as the director of pro personnel and last year was his first as assistant director of player personnel.
The Patriots could also look internally at Eliot Wolf, who came to the Patriots last year as a ‘front office consultant.’ He was the Cleveland Browns’ assistant general manager (2018-2019) and worked in Green Bay from 2004-2017 in many different front-office roles, including director of player personnel. The Pats could also promote college scouting director Brian Smith, who’s been in New England for the past nine seasons.
In the end, Caserio follows a long line of Patriots front-office employees to move up in the NFL. He joins the likes Jason Licht (Tampa Bay’s current GM), Jon Robinson (Tennessee’s current GM), Bob Quinn (Lions’ GM from 2016-2020), Scott Pioli (Kansas City GM from 2009-2012) and Thomas Dimitroff (former Atlanta GM from 2008-2020).
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