Legendary GM Bill Polian on Hiring Tom Telesco

Longtime NFL general manager Bill Polian kick-started Las Vegas Raiders' general manager Tom Telesco's career as an NFL executive.

The Las Vegas Raiders could truly have something special with general manager Tom Telesco.

While the teams he built during his years with the Los Angeles Chargers were not always successful on the field, Telesco clearly has an eye for talent.

Telesco's mentor, legendary NFL general manager Bill Polian, knew of Telesco's potential before he was even brought on as an scout for Polian's Carolina Panthers in the mid-1990s.

"This goes back all the way back to when he was in high school playing alongside my sons at St. Francis High School in Athol Springs, New York outside Buffalo," Polian told our Hondo S. Carpenter Sr. on a recent episode of the "Las Vegas Raiders Insider" podcast. "A great high school athlete, great basketball player, great football player, and friends, obviously, and teammates with my sons. And all of them worked as ball boys in training camp with the Bills.

"And so, the more I was around them, the more I realized that this was a young man with lots of talent, lots of integrity, terrific work ethic, very smart, came from a great family, and so, when the opportunity arose to take some of these young people from the ball boy role into a new employee type of role, when we got to Carolina, it was a natural [fit]. No question about it."

As general manager of the Bills, Polian assembled one of the greatest NFL teams of all time. His Bills, led by Hall-of-Fame quarterback Jim Kelly, appeared in four straight Super Bowls, though they were unable to win any of them.

Telesco served as an summer intern for much of Buffalo's run. When Polian became general manager of the Carolina Panthers, Telesco followed him to become an area scout for the club. Telesco would join his mentor again with the Indianapolis Colts in the late 1990s, serving as an area scout, then a pro scout, then the director of pro scouting, then the director of player personnel under Polian, the general manager and team president.

In 2009, Polian became strictly the team president, and in 2012, Telesco became the Colts' vice president of football operations.

You can watch Carpenter's full interview with Polian here.

The NFL Draft will be held in Detroit, Mich., on April 25-27, 2024. The Las Vegas Raiders currently have the No. 13 overall pick.

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