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Tyler Habursky

Browns Announce 8 Hires, 7 Promotions In Front Office

June 27th, 2025 at 7:26pm CST by Ely Allen

Yesterday, the Browns announced more than a handful of new hires and promotions in their operations, player personnel, and analytics departments. Operations had one new hire and one promotion, player personnel had four new hires and four promotions, and analytics had three new hires and two promotions.

The biggest ticket items were in the player personnel department, so we’ll start there. With Dan Saganey‘s departure and subsequent hiring in Tennessee, Adam Al-Khayyal steps into Saganey’s old role as director of player personnel. Al-Khayyal has been in Cleveland for the past 10 years, starting as an intern in 2015 before getting promotions to assistant director of pro personnel and director of pro scouting.

Matt Donahoe was elevated from southeast area scout to national scout. Having joined the Browns six years ago after time with the Chiefs, Donahoe enters his 12th season of NFL work. Filling in as a new area scout will be John Nussman, though he will cover the midwest region. This is the second straight year of promotions for Nussman, who was named NFS scout for the team last year after four seasons as a scouting assistant. Stepping into the newly vacant NFS scout role will be Tyler Habursky, who was hired last year as a scouting assistant.

The big new hire in the player personnel department is Shaun Herock, who comes in as the team’s new senior college personnel advisor. Herock started in the NFL as a scouting intern for the Falcons in in the ’90s. In 1994, Green Bay hired him after a short internship with them, and he eventually rose through the ranks to become assistant director of college scouting, serving in the role for 11 seasons. He left to serve as director of college scouting for the Raiders, serving as interim general manager in his last season with the team following the dismissal of Reggie McKenzie. When he, too, was let go at the end of the 2018 season, he joined the Browns as a scout and, eventually, was promoted to national scout. He returned to the Raiders as a personnel advisor in 2022, but he departs from the Raiders for Cleveland once more after three years away.

The other three new hires in the player personnel department are all new scouting assistants. Josh Meyer, Andrew Nimo-Sefah, and Ryan Smith were all hired to serve in that role. Meyer joins the team after working as a player personnel & recruiting analyst at his alma mater, Michigan, a role he earned after working as a recruiting intern as a student. Nimo-Sefah interned for the Cardinals in various roles as a student before working for the NFL GSISS support team and as a stats analyst for ESPN after that. Smith has experience with the team as an external film analyst in the team’s past two drafts, but he’ll now be paid directly by the team in his new position.

In operations, the new hire is the big-ticket item as James Cook joins the team as senior director of player development. Cook began his career in the NFL’s London office, working in several international projects like the International Player Pathway Program, flag football, the NFL Academy, and NFL Africa. Most recently, Cook served as head of player development for the league’s newest Academy based in Asia-Pacific. The promotion in operations looks a bit more like a lateral move. Hajriz Aliu, who has served the team as a scouting assistant for the past three seasons, is changing departments and will serve now as a football operations assistant in 2025.

In analytics, the two promotions see Abby Protin named senior software developer of football information systems and Jacqueline Roberts named coordinator of coaching logistics. Protin joined the team in 2022 as a software developer after time as a data analyst for the University of Maryland baseball team. Roberts joined the Browns last year as an intern within team logistics. She came in with experience in coaching operations from her work at the Senior Bowl.

Protin’s group adds two new junior software developers in Evan Stanislaw and John Michael Tran. Stanislaw has some work experience in sports from his time working for the NHL’s Dallas Stars, while Tran comes to Cleveland after internships at NASA and Amazon. Lastly, Ethan Weissman has been hired to the group as a football research analyst. This comes after the Harvard graduate served the past two years as a research & strategy intern for the team.

Browns Announce Several Front Office Moves

June 8th, 2024 at 1:53pm CST by Ely Allen

After not having seen a season with an 11-win total since 1994, the Browns have now seen it twice since 2020. As Cleveland continues to work towards staying in relevancy, owner Jimmy Haslam and general manager Andrew Berry continue to make adjustments to their front office.

In the operations department, the team saw a new hire and two promotions. Charles Adair comes in from Jacksonville after spending last year as a seasonal intern for the Jaguars. Adair will serve in Cleveland as coordinator, team logistics. Hunter Carson, previously an intern for the team logistics group, has been promoted to football operations assistant. She will reportedly work closely with the personnel department to assist with processes pertaining to player acquisition. Lastly in operations, Joy Tapajcik has been promoted to director of football operations & process after four seasons of working her way through roles all across the front office.

The player personnel department saw the most change in this week’s announcement. Firstly, we learned that the official job title for Chris Polian will be advisor to the general manager. After that, we saw the arrival of four new hires. Elisha Guidry, Tyler Habursky, and Sam Secrest join the team as scouting assistants, filling the roles vacated by some of the promotions listed below. Secrest moves into an in-house role with the Browns after serving as an external film analyst during this recent draft cycle. While Habursky previously served as a student defensive quality control coach at John Carroll, both he and Guidry will be making their NFL staff debuts after playing careers in college. Lastly, Jack Slatery joins the staff as a player personnel assistant after four years in the behavioral health industry.

The player personnel department also saw a number of promotions, as well. A long-time former linebacker in Cleveland, D’Qwell Jackson enters his second season in the front office after supporting player development last year. Jackson has been promoted in his second year to pro scout. He’s joined as a new pro scout by Greg Livingston and Alice Sullivan. They both earn the promotion after serving as scouting assistants in 2023. Livingston previously saw a coaching role at Northwestern and a recruiting role at Boston College. Sullivan will add the title of contract analyst to her new role, as well. Before joining the Browns, she worked as a football analyst for advance scout at LSU.

Additionally, Kathleen Wood is being promoted to scouting/personnel assessment & development after serving three of her four years with the team as the northeast area scout. She will contribute to day-to-day operations for personnel while continuing to contribute as a college road scout. Cyrus Wolford moves into Wood’s old role covering the northeast. He spent his first two seasons with the team as a scouting assistant after time in football operations at Temple. John Nussman is another former scouting assistant. After four years in that role, Nussman will be promoted to an NFS area scout, contributing to NFL combine and team draft initiatives. Lastly in personnel, Will Black has been promoted to scouting assistant, transitioning from a director of administration role with the Haslam Sports Group where he assisted team leadership with day-to-day operations.

Finally, the team saw a promotion in their analytics department, as well. Zach Zelinsky has been moved up into a manager role in football information systems. Currently entering his seventh season with the team, Zelinsky started with the Browns as a software developer in 2017 after working as an analytics intern for the Pittsburgh Pirates of the MLB.