In a year filled with remarkable progress from women in the NFL, Thursday produced a new milestone.
The Philadelphia Eagles promoted Catherine Raiche to VP of football operations as part of a number of departmental changes announced Thursday. Raiche's promotion makes her the new highest-ranking woman in personnel in the league's history.
Raiche previously served as the Eagles football operations/player personnel coordinator from 2019-2020 following a five-year stint spent between the Toronto Argonauts and Montreal Alouettes of the Canadian Football League, where she held the title of assistant general manager with the Alouettes. Raiche's new role was previously held by Andrew Berry, who left the Eagles to take the GM job with the Browns and has directed Cleveland's rapid turnaround that saw the Browns win 11 regular-season games in 2020 and secure their first playoff victory since the 1994 season.
Raiche's promotion comes on the heels of Denver's hiring of Kelly Kleine as the Broncos' new executive director of football operations. Kleine officially moved from Minnesota, where she'd spent the last nine years in the Vikings' scouting department, to Denver on May 17.
Also notable among the Eagles' front-office changes was the hiring of former Jaguars GM Dave Caldwell as a personnel executive in Philadelphia. Caldwell spent eight years as the head of Jacksonville's personnel department, overseeing a turnaround that included a trip to the AFC Championship Game during the 2017 season but was short-lived. From 2013-2020, the Jaguars posted an overall record of 37-91, amounting to a winning percentage of just 0.289 amid Caldwell's firing last November.
Caldwell heads to Philadelphia to join a front office that has produced promising general managers elsewhere (current Browns GM Berry and Jets GM Joe Douglas), but has come under fire for its own decisions in recent years. The Eagles are in the midst of what can be termed a fluid rebuild following the trade of former first-round pick Carson Wentz, and had to spend much of the offseason digging their way out of salary cap issues while turning over an aging roster.
With their changes in their front office and an offseason of work on their roster nearly complete, the Eagles appear to be better positioned for the future with a trailblazer among the franchise's key decision-makers.
