Catherine Raiche is a fixture around the NFL world. The highly-respected Philadelphia Eagles’ VP of football operations will end up being a general manager at some point soon.
That could potentially come as early as this off-season.
According to ESPN’s Adam Schefter, the Minnesota Vikings have requested permission to interview Catherine Raiche for their vacant general manager job following the firing of Rick Spielman.
Only 33 years old, Raiche is in her third season with the Philadelphia Eagles. She was promoted to VP of football operations last off-season after originally joining the organization as football operations/player personnel coordinator in 2019.
Prior to her arrival in Philadelphia, Raiche spent five yars working in the Canadian Football League. That included front office stints with the Toronto Argonauts and Montreal Alouettes. In 2017, she was the assistant general manager for Montreal — becoming the first woman to hold that title in the league.
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Catherine Raiche to join Susan Tose Spencer in NFL history books?
Shockingly, Raiche wouldn’t be the first women to hold the general manager title in the NFL. That distinction goes to the great Susan Tose Spencer.
She spent three seasons as the Eagles’ general manager under her father, then-owner Leonard Tose. During that span, Tose Spencer is credited with helping rebuild a team that would ultimately make three consecutive runs to the playoffs later in the decade.
That included selecting franchise great Randall Cunningham in the second-round of the 1985 NFL Draft as well as Hall of Famer Reggie White in the 1984 Supplemental Draft.
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As for Catherine Raiche, she’d be joining a Vikings organization in the midst of vast changes following the firing of the aforementioned Spielman as well as long-time head coach Mike Zimmer.
Minnesota is looking to go in a different direction after a second consecutive non-playoff season. It also appears that any new general manager would lead the search for a head coach to replace Zimmer.
If Raiche is hired, she’d become the second-youngest general manager in the NFL behind Andrew Berry of the Cleveland Browns. It would also change the landscape of professional football in the United States as we know it.