Dolphins rookie GM displays confident mindset ahead of 2026 NFL draft

The 2026 NFL Draft is less than a week away, and the Miami Dolphins have a rookie general manager running their war room in Jon-Eric Sullivan. Although this is his first go at being the head executive in the room, his 20 years with the Green Bay Packers organization give him an excellent prerequisite to handle the task at hand. Sullivan has had a great mentor to learn from in Brian Gutekunst, who has been the Packers' general manager since 2018 and with the organization since 1999.

Sullivan started his run in Green Bay in 2004 as a football operations assistant while Gutekunst was in the middle of his scout role. Gutekunst served as director of college scouting from 2012-2015, and then the precursor to taking over as general manager was serving as director of player personnel from 2016-2017. Sullivan has mirrored that career path, becoming director of college scouting in 2016, then being promoted to co-director of player personnel in 2018, and finally to vice president of player personnel in 2022.

Now in Miami, Sullivan is taking the reins of a front office and made it very clear in a recent press conference who the boss is when it comes to making selections in this draft process. He told reporters confidently, “It's my call. ” Sullivan has been rather open and transparent in his meetings with South Florida reporters and has given some indication as to how he intends to rebuild a roster, which has been essentially torn down and, in his words, has already gotten “younger and cheaper.

” When trying to jump into his mindset on how he will lean in his selections, Sullivan has indicated a traditional ideology. "We'll build this from the inside out... we've seen teams that go about it maybe in a questionable way and you get a really good player at quarterback, but he can't stay healthy because he's getting killed," Sullivan said.