Commanders name Adam Peters to be the new director of football operations. Here’s what you need to know about the former 49ers general manager
This off-season, the Commanders had new owners. Soon, they’ll have a new boss. They hired Adam Peters, a former assistant general manager for the 49ers, on Friday to run the front office and help with the overhaul.
The choice was confirmed by Jonathan Jones, lead NFL analyst for CBS Sports. It comes just a few days after it was said that Washington had narrowed its hunt for a new head of sports operations to Peters as well as Bears assistant general manager Ian Cunningham, who was also interviewed.
Peters, 44, has been the right-hand man of 49ers GM John Lynch for the last three seasons. He works for the same San Francisco front office that chose or bought quarterback Brock Purdy along with running back Christian McCaffrey, both of whom are key players.
Peters was the team’s executive director of player operations from 2017 to 2020, before being promoted to assistant general manager. Throughout his career with the 49ers, they have made it to three NFC Championships and one Super Bowl.
The Commanders still have Martin Mayhew, a former 49ers executive, as their general manager, but Peters will be in charge of managing the people who work under Mayhew in the front office.
Mayhew and Marty Hurney, who used to be the general manager of the Panthers and is now the executive vice president of football personnel, could both be moved or fired.
Someone who knows about the move says that the Washington Commanders have agreed to hire Adam Peters, an executive with the San Francisco 49ers, as their new general manager.
The person talked to The Associated Press on Friday but asked to remain anonymous because the team hadn’t made the hire public yet. From now on, Peters will be in charge of the organization’s football plans.
Peters, who is 49 years old, was seen as one of the best options, and the Los Angeles Chargers and the Las Vegas Raiders were also interested in hiring him.
First as VP of player personnel, then for the last three as assistant general manager under John Lynch, he worked for the Niners for seven years.
Peters won three Super Bowls before moving back to the Bay Area, where he grew up. He won two with the Patriots as a scouting aid and then one with the Broncos during his eight years there.
Peters and Chicago AGM Ian Cunningham were the two people who were left in the running for the job.
Josh Harris, the owner, and his search group kept his promise for a “thorough but rapid” process to find and hire the next front office manager after firing Ron Rivera.
A news conference on Monday said that Harris was looking for the best people to build a top team that would regularly fight and win titles.
When he gets to Washington, Peters knows how to build a winning team because he worked for John Lynch within San Francisco and helped Lynch build a team that has been in the running for division or conference wins almost every year.
Now that Peters has worked with the Niners for three years, he will go east to try to make the Commanders change in the same way.
Now, Peters says the group will go through an extensive list of possible coaches to choose the next one for Washington.
Peters started his work as a scout for the New England Patriots in 2003. In 2009, he moved to the Denver Broncos to do the same thing, and in 2014, he was promoted to assistant director of higher education scouting in Denver.
In 2017, he became vice president of player personnel for the San Francisco 49ers. By 2021, he was assistant general manager, and he was part of the management team that led the team to all three NFC Championship Games, one conference win, and a spot in Super Bowl LIV.