Tom Roth

Lions To Add Tom Roth, Raiders’ Dwayne Joseph To Staff

Despite multiple changes atop the Raiders‘ front office, Dwayne Joseph stayed with the team in recent years. Brought in during Mike Mayock‘s GM tenure, Joseph lasted through Dave Ziegler‘s short run in charge. But the veteran exec is now moving on.

In place as the Raiders’ director of pro personnel, Joseph will not make it far past Tom Telesco‘s first draft as the team’s GM. Joseph recently left the Raiders for a Lions position, per the Las Vegas Review-Journal’s Vincent Bonsignore. The Lions are also hiring former Titans area scout Tom Roth, according to InsidetheLeague.com’s Neil Stratton.

The Raiders hired Joseph shortly after the 2019 draft, bringing him over after an Eagles tenure. As retooling continues in Las Vegas, the Raiders will separate from a staffer who held the same position under Mayock and Ziegler. Prior to following Mayock to Oakland, Joseph spent four years as the Eagles’ pro scouting director. Joseph collected a Super Bowl ring for his efforts under Howie Roseman in the 2010s.

Joseph, 51, played one season in the NFL, seeing action in 16 games with the 1995 Bears, after a career at Syracuse. He interviewed for the Raiders’ GM job in 2022; despite that position going to Ziegler, the Raiders kept Joseph on. The Raiders decided on Telesco over Champ Kelly for GM. While Mark Davis wanted Kelly to remain with the team as assistant GM, Joseph will end up departing in the wake of the Telesco hire.

Telesco brought over former Chargers interim GM JoJo Wooden as his senior director of player personnel. Although Wooden and Joseph overlapped as Syracuse defensive teammates under Paul Pasqualoni for multiple seasons in the early 1990s, the duo will separate shortly after Wooden’s Vegas arrival.

The Titans, who are retooling their scouting department in second-year GM Ran Carthon‘s second offseason, parted ways with Roth earlier this month. Roth was with the Titans for six years, coming to Tennessee during Jon Robinson‘s GM tenure. He spent the previous 14 years with the Bills. Roth and Joseph will join a Lions front office that lost longtime senior player personnel director Lance Newmark (to the Commanders) earlier this offseason. Joseph and Roth’s Detroit titles are not yet known.

NFL Front Office Updates: Titans, Browns, Eagles, Cardinals, Bears

We mentioned yesterday how a number of teams who have seen changes in the leadership of their front office may be making changes following the NFL Draft. These teams needed their staff at the time, with only weeks leading up to the draft, but with that process now over, the new leadership has started making changes.

The Titans are one such team making changes in recent days. One change is the apparent departure of college scout Tom Roth, who no longer appears on the team’s website, according to Neil Stratton of SucceedinFootball.com. Roth had spent the last six years in Tennessee after serving 14 years as a college scout for the Bills.

It’s not all departures, like yesterday. Stratton noticed two promotions in Tennessee’s front office, as well. Previously the team’s pro scouting coordinator, Rob Riederer now appears on the team’s website as assistant director of football strategy. Likewise, Bryce Wasserman has been promoted from manager of football strategy to chief of staff of football strategy.

Here are a few other updates in player personnel offices around the league:

  • The Browns also see a departure, per Stratton, with Joe Dever reportedly not returning to the team for 2024. Joining the team as a scouting intern in 2019, Dever had spent five years with Cleveland. He had risen to the position of mid-Atlantic scout before his departure.
  • The Eagles are also losing a longtime staffer, according to Stratton. A 15-year veteran of the NFL, Brad Obee will use the expiration of his contract with Philadelphia as a reason to pursue new opportunities in the NFL. Obee began his scouting career on the personnel staff of the Eagles in 2009, working his way up the ladder for six years. He left to serve as a pro scout for the Bears for the next six years before ultimately returning to Philadelphia as a college/pro scout for the past three.
  • The Cardinals, who we noted lost a personnel staffer in yesterday’s post, will also part ways with area scout Darius Vinnett, per Stratton. Vinnett’s contract was expiring, as well, and though Arizona offered him an extension to return in 2024, Vinnett has declined and will seek other opportunities.
  • Lastly, the Bears are moving forward without area scouts Drew Raucina and Sam Summerville, according to Stratton. Raucina is a holdover from the Ryan Pace-era, serving the last six years with the team. He had previously been a combine scout for the NFL. Summerville’s departure is a bit more surprising. He had been with Chicago since 2012 and was voted the BART List as one of the NFC’s best scouts in 2022, per Stratton. He was also named NFC Scout of the Year in 2019. Regardless, general manager Ryan Poles is making changes for the 2024 NFL season.