Should the Giants ownership opt to make a change at general manager by 2021, which many within the game believe is inevitable, Patriots personnel executive Nick Caserio will be near the top of their list of candidates, league sources said.
The team has long had interest in Caserio, who has withdrawn from opportunities to take general manager positions in the past and been prevented from pursuing others. New England is nearing a potential full-scale rebuild, while the Giants continue to lose games and struggle to contend even in the lowly NFC East. There were some within the organization who believed the Mara family should have made a general manager switch a year ago, when Joe Judge was hired to replace fired coach Pat Shurmur, and that pressure is mounting again, sources said, with the Giants plodding through what is shaping up as another lost season.
The Giants have been in a spiral of hirings and firings, with neither Shurmur nor Ben McAdoo lasting beyond two seasons. Caserio and Judge have strong ties from their years together in New England, and the allure of remaining in the Northeast is something that some close to Caserio believe would appeal to him. The Texans tried to hire Caserio in the past, and some involved in their general manager search remain quite high on him, but the Texans are short on draft picks and there are concerns throughout the industry about how that franchise might be restructured.
The Giants have traditionally given their general managers a very long tenure and that franchise has always kept a close eye on the Patriots given their connection to New England coach Bill Belichick, who rose to prominence as a young defensive coach in New York on Bill Parcells' staff. Belichick has managed to prevent Caserio from leaving in the past but sources said his current contract makes it clear he can depart for any GM opening, and there is a heavy expectation within the sport that a half dozen of those jobs will be open by January.
