Panthers Look to Reset & Refresh with New GM Search
Marty Hurney spent a total of 14 seasons as the general manager of the Carolina Panthers serving two different stints (2002-12, 2018-20).
Throughout his time as the GM, Hurney helped piece together some successful teams including four playoff appearances, two NFC South division titles, and a Super Bowl appearance. Hurney also drafted some of the best players the franchise has ever seen including QB Cam Newton and LB Luke Kuechly. Hurney had a knack for hitting on first-rounders, but to be a quality general manager in the National Football League, you have to have more success in the draft beyond the first round. Unfortunately, this was an area he struggled in and played a part in his exit.
With the Panthers firing Ron Rivera last season, there was a lot of speculation that team owner Tepper would "clean house" so to speak, and fire Hurney as well. According to Tepper, it was not the right move to make at the time. He thought about it but there was still value in having Hurney in the building.
"Marty has a lot of good characteristics," Tepper stated. "I do think he's a good evaluator of individual talents. There are some process things, evaluation things that are questionable - methods I'm saying. How we do things and how we go about it. Quite frankly, I think it was good for Matt [Rhule] and good for me to have another year with Marty. Marty is a great guy to have as a teacher and a person like that around. People think that you can come in here and even though I was around football for a while, I wasn't there. Sometimes I think it's not a bad idea to have a good teacher around to teach you some aspects and at some point, you graduate and try to figure if you can do other things away from it and maybe better. That's kind of where we are. Again, Marty Hurney is a very good evaluator and has a lot of good aspects to him. Me and Matt learned from Marty a lot. Sometimes the students have to graduate."
Although the Panthers elected to keep him through the final year of his contract, Tepper knew it was a decision that had to be made regardless of what the team's record was.
"I think at the end of the day, at some point it was going to be inevitable. I don't know if it was inevitable but it was a question of where we are now and how processes are done. I'm a very process-oriented, analytical person, and not that Marty is not. It's just a little bit different process. And I'll say it again the students are graduating from what is a very good teacher."
By making this move now, it allows the Panthers to get a little bit of a head start on their search to replace Hurney. Tepper told reporters that it is going to be important that they consider candidates who are not only good decision-makers but are on the same page as the head coach and have the same vision for the team's future.
"Like I said, there has to be an alignment between the coach and the GM. The person has to be a collaborator, not afraid to make decisions. Collaboration doesn't mean you don't have arguments about who you're picking. Somebody who is a good decision-maker, a good manager.
"I think we can start going out and talking to people who aren't on other teams right now. We have to wait until the end of the season to talk about other folks. If we can bring somebody in earlier the better. We'll have provisions if we don't get it done by the draft. The earlier the better and on the other hand if we don't very soon, we'll be ready for the draft no matter what."
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