Rob Brzezinski - Minnesota Vikings interim general manager
John McKay - Los Angeles Rams assistant general manager
Terrance Gray - Buffalo Bills assistant general manager
Reed Burkhardt - Denver Broncos assistant general manager
Nolan Teasley - Seattle Seahawks assistant general manager
In February, I looked at the front office of the Seattle Seahawks. They’d had about a a dozen years of success. A Super Bowl win in 2013 and another in 2026. Those 13 years were the 13 years Nolan Teasley spent with the team. In February, I skipped past Teasley and circled VP of Player Personnel Trent Kirchner as my preferred Seahawk for the Vikings GM job. My reasoning of favoring Kirchner over Teasley was the 27 years the former had scouting in the league. When Teasley was a Vikings GM target rather than Kirchner, I dove further into Teasley’s career. I think the Vikings lucked out in running an unusual May GM search. If they’d waited until to the 2027 offseason, there would’ve been competition for Nolan Teasley. Now, they have him and the team’s future feels a whole lot brighter.
At a Sports Management conference earlier this year, Nolan Teasley was asked what separates a good evaluator from a great general manager. His answer:
Being open minded and organized are the two things I’m gonna tell you. Because when I think about our process and how we make decisions on player acquisition- I don’t have enough hubris, I’m not arrogant enough to tell you I’m better at watching football than you are- but I do have a process and I think my superpower is the ability to take in information from a lot of different people that have different areas of expertise, then implement that and build a process off of that, that ultimately leads me to try and make sound decisions in a short period of time.“
The first time I saw that response, it gave me chills. The Daily Norseman posted it in their dive into Nolan Teasley and it gave me chills. The fact that he has a self-realized superpower is one thing. The fact the superpower involves collaboration and listening to the input of others shouldn’t be a startling thing. Media and fans want the name of one person that’s making all decisions. I have truly come to believe that people desire one person to blame when things go to shit. They accept collaboration when it results in wins and championships. They thrive on blaming one person when the wins don’t come. Throughout this offseason, Vikings interim general manger Rob Brzenzinski stressed collaboration and reaching a consensus. Many found it annoying. I believe that they found it annoying because a consensus eliminates their singular target. Anyway, the media and Vikings fans now have one to person to blame if the Vikings season, any Vikings season, goes off the rails. Here’s hoping that there’s no reason for finger-pointing.
Over 66 years of franchise history, the Vikings had hired only two general managers that climbed through the football scouting ranks. The first was Jim Finks. He has a bust in the Pro Football Hall of Fame for the Super Bowl teams he built in Minnesota. The second was Rick Spielman. 66 years of Vikings football and only 26 of them were guided by an individual with legit football team-building experience. Nolan Teasley is the third. It’s a damn shame the Vikings had spent so much time being guided by individuals that really had no business building an NFL team. It’s as much a reason as any for no Lomabardi Trophies being in that barren cabinet. That’s in the past. The now is a Vikings future guided by Nolan Teasley, Kevin O’Connell, and Brian Flores.
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