Pats Pulpit
The Patriots have filled a big vacancy in their front office.
More than two months after previous pro scouting director Patrick Stewart left the organization, the New England Patriots have hired a replacement. A.J. Highsmith was brought aboard within days of being let go by his previous team, the Tennessee Titans.
Let’s analyze what the move means from a New England perspective.
In case Highsmith’s name sounded familiar, it’s because it is. His father, Alonzo Highsmith, joined the Patriots last offseason to serve as a senior personnel executive. What exactly the elder Highsmith’s job title entails is not known, but he is playing an important role within the New England front office.
It is therefore not hard to put two and two together: Alonzo likely had an active hand in the Patriots hiring A.J. as pro scouting director. That does not mean the latter is ripe for the “nepo baby” label, though.
The younger Highsmith, after all, is bringing an extensive résumé to New England — one he built without any obvious help from his father. Whereas Alonzo worked in Green Bay, Cleveland, Seattle and at the University of Miami before joining the Patriots, A.J.’s career in scouting took him from San Francisco to Buffalo and Tennessee.
Over the course of his 11-year career, he garnered experience both in pro and college scouting and steadily worked his way up the ladder. He most recently worked as the Titans’ scouting director, but was let go after this year’s draft as part of a general restructure under new general manager Mike Borgonzi.
His father either directly or indirectly helping Highsmith find a new job quickly would not be a surprise. However, that does not mean he is not qualified for the position.
The Patriots’ previous staff hires this offseason mostly followed a familiar theme: they were, in one way or another, connected to new head coach Mike Vrabel. Look no further than Ryan Cowden and John “Stretch” Streicher, who joined the team as vice president of player personnel and vice president of football operations and strategy, respectively, after previously spending time with Vrabel in Tennessee.
Highsmith also has a Titans background, but he did not overlap with Vrabel, Cowden or Streicher in the Music City. In fact, outside of his family ties, he has no noticeable previous connections with the New England front office.
This means that Highsmith could bring a new perspective of pro player evaluation to the organization and his new role; he learned the craft in his previous stops under general managers such as John Lynch, Brandon Beane and Ran Carthon. This is something Patriots executive vice president of player personnel Eliot Wolf might have been drawn to.
As previously mentioned, Wolf criticized his team’s free agency research in 2024, claiming that “some of the information that we got on some of the players wasn’t as thorough as it needed to be.” The hope will be that adding Highsmith helps address that...
