Vikings Hire 49ers' Demitrius Washington as VP of Football Operations

Washington was in San Francisco's research and development department for the last seven years.

The Vikings have hired former 49ers manager of football research and development Demitrius Washington as their vice president of football operations, the team announced on Monday. This is a big addition for general manager Kwesi Adofo-Mensah, who is starting to shape the Vikings' front office the way he wants.

Washington has nine years of NFL experience. He got started as a game charter intern with the Browns in 2013, then was hired by the 49ers in 2015. There, Washington worked alongside Adofo-Mensah for five years in San Francisco's R&D department. When Adofo-Mensah was hired by the Browns to be their VP of football ops, Washington took over as the manager of the department.

Over the past two seasons, Washington "managed and oversaw the department’s efforts in optimization and process improvement and developed predictive and statistical analysis for player evaluation, acquisition and strategy," per the Vikings' release.

Now he's got the same job title in Minnesota that Adofo-Mensah held for two years in Cleveland.

“We couldn’t be more excited to have Demitrius join the Vikings front office,” Adofo-Mensah said. “He is one of the most uniquely gifted people I have met in my time in the NFL. He is able to learn complex ideas, make them simple, and apply them in all facets of the organization. He has learned from some of the best minds in the game today and he will continue to flourish in his role with Vikings."

Hiring an R&D person as the VP of football ops is a move that continues to establish Adofo-Mensah's Vikings as an analytics-forward organization. Washington is following the same path taken by Adofo-Mensah and will be a big addition to the Vikings' front office while boosting his resume to potentially be in the mix for GM openings in the future.

Washington went to the University of Central Arkansas for undergrad and earned a master’s of business administration with an emphasis in finance and analytics from the University of Missouri.

This is the second major hire the Vikings have made in the front office since Adofo-Mensah took over. The first was adding former Colts GM Ryan Grigson as a senior football advisor.

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