By Paul Bowman, Sports Talk Philly Editor
The Eagles lost one of their most valuable assets on Friday in the form of Joe Douglas.
The team had known that the move was coming, they just did not know when. The Jets firing their GM opened up the first opportunity for Douglas and the Jets simply would not take no for an answer, needing to sweeten the pot and ask again to finally get him to move out to New Jersey.
Since the team knew the move was coming and Douglas was a front-runner for the position with the Jets from Day 1, the team had plenty of time to come up with a plan for if and when it happened.
Once the move was official, the concern moved to the Eagles personnel department. While Howie Roseman had his hand in some of the personnel department, Joe Douglas built and hired one of the best departments in the league that assisted in building one of the best locker room cultures in the league.
The question became would Joe Douglas be able to pry key members of the department away to serve for the Jets, or could the Eagles hang on to these key players.
As Geoff Mosher of ESPN reports, the ladder appears to be true as the team announced the internal promotions of 10 major players in the department.
Full list of #Eagles front office titles, including a new title for Howie Roseman, too.
Big takeaway: Roseman/Lurie preserving identity/culture Joe Douglas brought to Philly’s scouting dept. by promoting several guys Joe hired. pic.twitter.com/3uOgcskz1u
— Geoff Mosher (@GeoffMosherNFL) June 13, 2019
The first note about Howie Roseman is a bit of paperwork, really. Roseman has been the de-facto general manager since his return to the team and he was just now given the title now that Douglas is out of the picture.
Andy Weidl is the biggest move of the bunch. Weidl served as the man under Douglas last season and will take his position as the Vice President of Football Operations. It would be a very good bet that if the Eagles hadn’t offered him the position, Joe Douglas would have in New York and the Eagles would have lost two of their top three guys in a matter of weeks.
In addition to the 10 promotions, the Eagles made three hires within the department. Max Gruder is the biggest of the three as the new Assistant Director of Pro Scouting. Gruder has spent the last seven season in the Miami Dolphins scouting department.