Despite both Martin Mayhew and Marty Hurney having been key Ron Rivera lieutenants in Washington, both stayed on following the HC’s 2024 firing. Mayhew and Hurney were part of the staff that assembled the franchise’s first NFC championship game entrant since 1991, but both are moving on.
Mayhew, who was part of that famed 1991 Washington team as a cornerback, has announced his retirement, GM Adam Peters confirmed Tuesday. The former Lions and Commanders GM, who will turn 60 later this year, has been an NFL exec since 1999. He was in place as a senior personnel executive in 2024.
In place as an advisor to the GM, Hurney is no longer with the team after his contract expired, ESPN.com’s John Keim tweets. This is not necessarily a firing, as Keim adds this was the expected path for Hurney, who twice served as Panthers GM before rejoining Rivera in Washington.
As for Mayhew, he arrived for his second GM role in 2021. Rivera had operated as coach/GM, effectively, in 2020 but brought in Mayhew for a Washington reunion. Mayhew played four seasons with Washington (1989-92), starting 48 games for the team and collecting a Super Bowl ring in the process. He signed with Tampa Bay during a 1993 offseason that introduced full-fledged free agency to the NFL. Mayhew wrapped his career after four Buccaneers seasons, transitioning to the personnel side not long after.
Serving under ex-teammate Matt Millen for eight years in Detroit, Mayhew succeeded him as GM and held the role for seven-plus years. The Lions fired Millen during their winless 2008 season, and Mayhew helped guide them out of the abyss. The team’s 2009 Matthew Stafford draft choice helped key playoff appearances in 2011 and ’14, with Mayhew’s Jim Caldwell hire also leading to a 2016 playoff cameo. Though, the Lions had fired Mayhew by then. Mayhew served as one of ex-Bucs teammate John Lynch‘s lieutenants in San Francisco, being part of the 2019 staff that turned the team from 4-12 to an NFC champion.
While Mayhew’s Washington GM tenure did not produce a steady contender, he will retire after spending 26 seasons as a personnel man. Hurney, 69, began in the personnel ranks near the outset of Mayhew’s cornerback career.
A former Bobby Beathard staffer in San Diego, Hurney worked his way up to Panthers GM by 2002. Hurney had worked in Carolina previously and was in place as GM when the Panthers booked their Super Bowl XXXVIII trip — a last-second loss to the Patriots. That GM stay lasted 11 years but ended after the 2012 season. Following their Dave Gettleman firing, the Panthers circled back to Hurney, whose second stint in the GM role ran from 2017-20.
Rivera hired Hurney as executive VP of player personnel in 2021. It is not known if Hurney is retiring for good, but he has spent more than 30 years as an NFL exec. The last of which came helping Peters, along with Mayhew, construct an unlikely Super Bowl contender.
As Peters builds his second Commanders team, the coaching staff will include Jesse Madden, who is the grandson of legendary coach/announcer John Madden. Jesse is certainly young in this profession, having recently graduated from Michigan. He was part of the Wolverines’ roster that won the national championship in 2023.
