Sports

Seahawks win: John Schneider stays, Packers hire their personnel director to be GM instead

(Photo by Kevin C. Cox/Getty Images)

RENTON, Wash. — Turns out his coach was right in saying he was convinced John Schneider wasn’t going anywhere.

The Green Bay Packers on Sunday chose their director of player personnel Brian Gutekunst to be their new general manager. That was a day after the Seahawks denied the Packers permission to talk to Schneider, who grew up six miles south of Green Bay’s Lambeau Field, about the job.

Schneider was believed to be the Packers’ top choice. He remains with Seattle instead. He’s been the Seahawks’ GM since January 2010, arriving the same month coach Pete Carroll did.

A NFL source with knowledge of the situation confirmed to me Saturday the Seahawks denied the Packers permission to talk to Schneider.

John McClain of the Houston Chronicle and ESPN.com’s Adam Schefter first reported Gutekunst’s hiring Sunday.

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Schneider said in July 2016 when he signed his contract extension with Seattle his new deal through 2020 did not include an out clause to become the Packers’ GM. Schneider’s first Seahawks contract from 2010 reportedly had such out. He grew up in De Pere, Wisconsin.

The Packers created their opening this past week when they moved general manager Ted Thompson to a special-assistant’s job. Thompson had been the Packers’ GM since 2005. His personnel analyst in Green Bay that year, and in 2006 and ’07: Schneider.

Schneider, 46, was a young scout with the Packers in the early 1990s, having talked his way into an internship and eventually a job by cold-calling then-Green Bay GM Ron Wolf while still in college. Schneider was with the Packers’ front office from 2002 until January 2010. That’s when he left his job as the Packers’ director of football operations for Thompson to become a first-time NFL GM with Seattle, to rebuild the Seahawks with Carroll.

I asked Carroll on Tuesday if he was convinced Schneider would remain his GM this offseason for 2018.

"Yeah, I am. As a matter of fact, I am,” Carroll said. “I’m convinced of that.

"I think he’s going to be here, yeah. That’s what I’m counting on."

When Schneider became a first-time GM with the Seahawks in January 2010, Carroll was already Seattle’s coach for a week reshaping the franchise in his way. That authority is how former Seahawks chief executive Tod Leiweke got Carroll from USC.

Schneider was asked the day he arrived in Seattle eight years ago about Carroll having the title of executive vice president and equal or more authority than the general manager on personnel issues with the Seahawks. Schneider just shrugged.

"When this thing went down with Coach Carroll I had a moment where I thought, 'OK, that was different,’” Schneider said on Jan. 20, 2010. “But that's how they had to do it to get a guy of his caliber.”

Since then, Carroll and Schneider have portrayed their leadership of the Seahawks as a unique, symbiotic partnership and collaboration. In 2013, the Seahawks added “executive vice president” to Schneider’s GM title.

The Seahawks describe the relationship now as Schneider “manages all aspects of the Seahawks roster and draft process while working collaboratively with Pete Carroll in all facets of the football operations department.”

Carroll has called Schneider “the best guy to work with.”

That partnership will continue--even though the Packers didn’t want it to.

Click here to read the full article on the Tacoma News Tribune.