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Bears GM candidate profile: Get to know Eliot Wolf

Alyssa Barbieri
·3 min read

The Chicago Bears fired general manager Ryan Pace after seven seasons, and they’ve wasted no time exploring candidates to replace him.

Chairman George McCaskey, President/CEO Ted Phillips, Hall of Fame executive Bill Polian, VP of Player Engagement Lamar ‘Soup’ Campbell and Senior VP of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Tanesha Wade will conduct the search for Chicago’s next GM, a process which McCaskey promised would be “thorough, diligent and exhausted.”

The Bears have cast a wide net of GM candidates that they’ve extended interviews to, including New England Patriots front office consultant Eliot Wolf, who interviewed for the job earlier this week.

Let’s take an in-depth look at what Wolf brings to the table in our Bears GM candidate profile:

Background

  • Current Job: Senior consultant, New England Patriots (2020-Present)

  • Age: 39

  • Hometown: Oakland, CA

  • College: Miami

Experience

  • Senior consultant, New England Patriots (2020-Present)

  • Assistant general manager, Cleveland Browns (2018-19)

  • Director of football operations, Green Bay Packers (2016-17)

  • Director of player personnel, Green Bay Packers (2015-16)

  • Director of pro personnel, Green Bay Packers (2012-15)

  • Assistant director of player personnel, Green Bay Packers (2011-12)

  • Assistant director of pro personnel, Green Bay Packers (2008-11)

  • Pro personnel assistant, Green Bay Packers (2004-08)

Analysis

Wolf is best known for being the son of Ron Wolf, but he’s had his share of success within the Packers organization for the first 13 years of his career. He got his start as a pro personnel assistant 2004 with Green Bay, and he’s climbed the ranks over the years. Wolf has served as everything from director of pro personnel to director of player personnel to director of football operations with the Packers. He won a Super Bowl ring with the 2010 squad.

After Wolf lost out on Green Bay’s GM job to Brian Gutekunst in 2018, he joined the Browns as their assistant GM under John Dorsey. When Wolf joined Cleveland, they were coming off an 0-16 season. While he left in 2019 — following Dorsey’s firing — he played a big role in bringing in the talent that led the Browns to a 11-5 record and postseason berth in 2020.

Wolf joined the Patriots in 2020, where he’s served as a senior consultant. The Patriots reorganized their front office this year, and Wolf is believed to be a big part of that. Wolf has been a part of two of the most successful organizations in the Patriots and Packers, so he knows what it takes to build a winning organization.

They said it...

“We have a great relationship. I’m very fond of the person, and the scout is excellent. I’ve told him that. I really want him to be here. But I also know he has other opportunities, and I wouldn’t hold him back from that because I care about him. … Eliot is going to be a GM soon, whether he stays here and then becomes a GM or whether he goes somewhere else and becomes a GM.”

— Packers GM Brian Gutekunst on Wolf in 2017 (via Chicago Tribune)

Bottom line

Wolf has been around some successful organizations in the Packers, Browns and Patriots, and that’s the kind of winning culture the Bears would certainly like to have. He has a slew of experience with the Packers, where he’s climbed the ranks and served in different roles. Given Wolf lost out on the Packers GM job to Gutekunst in 2018 and was blocked from interviewing for GM elsewhere, you figure no one wants to beat Green Bay more than Wolf. And beating the Packers remains a top priority for the Bears. But there’s more than goes into the decision than getting on the right side of a rivalry.

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