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MAN WITH THE PLAN: Michigan coach Brady Hoke (right) and former UCLA coach Rick Neuheisel (left) are two of many candidates recruited by executive headhunter Jed Hughes. (Getty Images; AP (inset); Korn/Ferry (Hughes))
Steve Bono let out a big laugh and his smile could be felt through the phone line, all in response to a reporter asking him about the Jets’ mystery man, an executive headhunter named Jed Hughes who very well may hold the fate of the franchise in his hands.
“He recruited most of us in the late ’70s, early ’80s, east of the Mississippi,” says Bono, who was lured to play quarterback at UCLA by Hughes, then the defensive coordinator, and subsequently followed him in two stops in the NFL, with the Vikings and Steelers.
“He’s a very smart guy, he was prepared,” said Bono, who was a one-time Pro Bowler and two-time Super Bowl champion in his 14-year NFL career. “He was very good at [recruiting] and that’s the reason that he got probably, gosh, 8 to 10 of us a year.”
Now it’s on Hughes to just get one — that is, one candidate to fill the role of Jets general manager. It is a position that has been vacant since owner Woody Johnson fired Mike Tannenbaum one day after the team’s playoff-less 6-10 season ended last Sunday.
Johnson immediately hired Hughes to help find a replacement, something he did last year when Hughes helped him find team president Neil Glat.
“He was relentless,” said Rick Neuheisel, who walked on as a UCLA quarterback in 1980 at the urging of Hughes. “It used to be just him recruiting the whole country, and he never stopped until the job was complete.”
Before Hughes went to UCLA, he was an assistant at Michigan under one of the five Hall of Fame coaches he has worked for, Bo Schembechler. He eventually went on to be a defensive backs coach under Bud Grant with the Vikings, and then a linebackers coach under Chuck Noll with the Steelers.
Through his public relations people, Hughes declined comment while the search for the Jets is ongoing. Yet when asked to speculate on what type of person Hughes might be looking for in order to fill the Jets’ role, Bono leaned towards someone with a career arch much like Hughes’ own.
“If I had to guess I would say it’s going to be someone who is a football person first,” Bono said. “Someone who has been in several organizations, has been in several roles, and knows the business top to bottom. Not only the business of the sport, but also the game of football.”
Neuheisel went one step further into specifics.
“I think he’s going to go after someone who understands how to develop a quarterback,” said Neuheisel, who went on to coach UCLA from 2008-11and is now a commentator on the PAC-12 network. “I’m sure Jed would never say it publicly but that is where the Jets need to improve.”
For about the past 20 years, armed with a doctorate in philosophy from Michigan focused on organizational behavior, Hughes has been in the field of executive recruiting. He is the go-to guy in the NFL and elite college personnel searches, having reportedly made upwards of $100,000 to fill roles like that of athletic director at Nebraska and head football coach at Michigan.
Michigan athletic director Dave Brandon declined to comment on his search with Hughes that landed coach Brady Hoke, citing the confidentiality of such searches. Yet Brandon’s hiring of Hughes, and Hughes’ finding of Hoke which turned around the legendary program, only bodes well for what the Jets hope is a similar change in fortune.
Hughes also spent time developing psychological assessments for the 49ers and Packers, and starting in January of 2012, he became the vice chairman of Korn/Ferry International, a large, C-level executive search firm.
“There’s no B.S. about him,” said Bono, who is now a principal at Constellation Wealth Management in Palo Alto, Ca., and talks with Hughes often. “He was always prepared. He knew the facts, he knew the history of UCLA [when recruiting for them]. Whatever he’s dealing with now, I’m sure he’s prepared just the same.”
“There’s no B.S. about him,” said Bono, who is now a principal at Constellation Wealth Management in Palo Alto, Calif., and talks with Hughes often. “He was always prepared. He knew the facts, he knew the history of UCLA [when recruiting for them]. Whatever he’s dealing with now, I’m sure he’s prepared just the same.”