Green Bay to Gang Green: Packers’ personnel chief could join McCarthy with Jets

Bill Walsh and Mike Shanahan have coaching trees. Pro Football Hall of Famer Ron Wolf has a general manager tree. In two months, that tree might take root at the Atlantic Health Jets Training Center.

That’s according to NFL insider Dan Graziano, who wrote this week that Packers vice president of player personnel Jon-Eric Sullivan is a potential candidate to replace Joe Douglas with the Jets. New York fired the general manager on Tuesday, six weeks after dismissing head coach Robert Saleh. Since purchasing the team in 2000, owner Woody Johnson has never hired a general manager with prior experience in that role.

“It would fit Woody Johnson’s history to tap a GM who hasn’t done the job before,” Graziano wrote, “so those up-and-comers are certainly worth watching.”

Graziano listed Sullivan along with assistant GMs Mike Borgonzi (Chiefs) and Ed Dodds (Colts) as potential names. He also wondered whether a soon-to-be coaching free agent, Mike McCarthy, might have interest if Johnson were to tap Sullivan, who helped the late Ted Thompson shape the Packers rosters during McCarthy’s tenure as Green Bay head coach. McCarthy is in the final year of his contract as head coach of the Cowboys.

A Wolf protégé, Thompson hit on his first draft choice as Packers general manager, Aaron Rodgers in 2005. A year later, he hired McCarthy as head coach. Graziano said McCarthy was a finalist for the Jets head-coaching job after he left the Packers.

“I wonder how much Johnson will think about the pairing with the coaching hire,” Graziano said, “and which job he’ll want to fill first. It’s pretty important the pair be aligned.”

If he aligns Sullivan with McCarthy, perhaps that would give the Jets another season of Aaron Rodgers aligned with Davante Adams, a receiver the Packers drafted out of Fresno State in 2014 when Sullivan served in Green Bay’s scouting department.

Sullivan’s father, Jerry, is a longtime assistant coach who spent time with the Chargers (1992-96), Lions (1997-2000), Cardinals (2001-03), Dolphins (2004), 49ers (2005-10) and Jaguars (2012-16) at the NFL level, in addition to several college stops.

The Jets (3-8) are on bye this week before hosting Seattle at MetLife Stadium on Dec. 1. Johnson named Phil Savage interim general manager after firing Douglas.

Wolf’s tree includes three current GMs: His son Eliot in New England, Super Bowl-winner John Schneider in Seattle and Brian Gutekunst in Green Bay. In addition to Thompson, who passed away in 2022, the tree also includes four former GMs: Reggie McKenzie (now with Miami), a former NFL executive of the year with the Oakland Raiders; John Dorsey (now with Detroit), who traded up in the 2017 draft as general manager of the Chiefs to select Patrick Mahomes; and Scot McCloughan, who served as GM for both San Francisco and Washington.

For more information on the Jets, visit the N.Y. Jets team page at ProFootballPost.com.