Eagles announce Joe Douglas replacement, new Howie Roseman title, and other front office changes

The Philadelphia Eagles officially announced some front office changes on Thursday evening. Here’s a look at the changes to the Eagles’ two main sectors: scouting and football operations.

Howie Roseman named Executive Vice President/General Manager

Andy Weidl promoted to Vice President of Player Personnel

Ian Cunningham promoted to Assistant Director of Player Personnel

Brandon Brown promoted to Director of Pro Scouting

Bryce Johnston promoted to Director of Football Administration

Katie David promoted to Football Operations Director

Casey Weidl promoted to Director of Scouting Operations

Max Gruder hired as Assistant Director of Pro Scouting

Matt Holland promoted to Senior Pro Scout

Chris Nolan promoted to Player Personnel Scout

Ameena Soliman hired as Player Personnel Coordinator

James Gilman hired as Quantitative Analyst

Ed Miller promoted to Assistant Equipment Manager

Craig Blake promoted to Assistant Equipment Manager

The most significant news is that Eagles director of player personnel Andy Weidl has been promoted to the old title that new New York Jets general manager Joe Douglas previously held: vice president of player personnel. I profiled Weidl as an obvious Douglas replacement earlier this week:

When the Eagles hired Douglas in 2016, they also hired Weidl to be his right hand man. Weidl originally held the title of “assistant director of player personnel” before having the “assistant” label dropped last year. Perhaps that change was made in anticipation of eventually losing Douglas.

One would think Douglas would prefer to bring Weidl with him to New York. Of course, the Eagles can deny Weidl from leaving assuming he’s still under contract. Philadelphia might want to promote Weidl to the title Douglas used to hold.

The Eagles value promoting from within so Weidl could be a natural Douglas replacement. The Pittsburgh native has “football guy” experience after playing college football at Villanova.

Promoting Weidl seems like a smart move. Continuity makes sense for a front office that’s been stable and successful in recent years.

In other noteworthy news, Howie Roseman has a new and even more lengthy title. He used to be the Eagles’ executive vice president of football operations. Now he’s listed as “executive vice president/general manager.” Roseman hasn’t officially had GM in his title since 2014. Of course, he’s been the Eagles’ de facto GM since returning to power in 2016 and he’ll remain in that role.

Ian Cunningham is essentially the new Andy Weidl in the way that Weidl used to be Douglas’s right hand man. Cunningham, formerly with the Ravens, was hired to be the Eagles’ director of college scouting back in 2017.

Eagles assistant director of pro scouting Brandon Brown has been promoted to Dwanye Joseph’s old role: director of pro scouting. Joseph left to join the Oakland Raiders’ front office earlier this offseason. The Eagles’ pro scouting staff has done a good job in recent years so this is an important position.

Max Gruder is a new addition to the Eagles’ front office; he previously worked for the Miami Dolphins. Gruder will hold the title of “assistant director of pro scouting” in Philly. The great Josh Norris previously had this to say about Gruder:

You might recall new Eagles director of football administration Bryce Johnston as the guy who used to run EaglesCap.com. Prior to even working for the team, he was tracking the Eagles’ cap space prior to sites like Over The Cap and Spotrac. Cool to see he’s moving up in the organization.

Here’s what Roseman had to say about all the changes:

“This is an exciting time for our front office. We are fortunate to have so many talented people in the building. Much like our approach to constructing our football team, we pride ourselves on building a deep and talented front office and we strive to create an environment that emphasizes growth opportunity. We are confident that providing increased responsibilities to Andy Weidl, who will lead our personnel staff, and Andrew Berry, who we recently brought to Philadelphia as our Vice President of Football Operations, will allow us to continue to build upon our culture and add to the leadership that exists across the entire football operations department, led by Greg Delimitros, Patrick Dolan, Dom DiSandro, Jon Ferrari, Alec Halaby, and Jake Rosenberg.”

Another important thing worth noting is that it looks like the Eagles won’t be losing many (if any) front office members to the Jets’ front office with Douglas now in control. That could always change if/when his old friends have their contracts run up and they want to join Douglas in New York. For now, though, the Eagles are retaining a lot of front office talent. And that’s important.