Image courtesy of Colby College
Even when there’s no ‘real’ news, there’s news when it comes to the Patriots.
Late in the afternoon on Friday, Mike Reiss reported that Robyn Glaser – who Pats fans never really knew until the last couple of years as the dynasty began to crumble – is resigning from her role as Executive Vice President of Football Business.
Glaser joined the Patriots in 2007 as a Senior Adviser to ownership. As Reiss points out, Pats fans are now well aware (thanks to the documentary where Glaser’s role in Spygate was depicted) that her first day on the job was actually during the NFL’s investigation of the Patriots’ videotaping scandal. Glaser has seen, heard and been through it all at 1 Patriot Place, having served with the organization for 18 years. Reiss also reports she’ll be staying on through February.
Glaser was elevated to Vice President in 2011 and Senior Vice President in 2018. In 2022, she added Senior Vice President, Business Affairs and Chief Administrative Officer of Football to her title. During her time with the team, Glaser was primarily responsible for all league business and legal issues, including league compliance. In 2024, Glaser was a Senior Adviser to head coach Jerod Mayo.
This is another sign of things truly changing in Foxborough. As we’ve all heard in recent weeks from Bill Belichick (he certainly never passed up an opportunity to mention her name), Glaser was a close confidant of the Krafts and was (as far as we know) often in the room for key negotiations. This move very well could signal just how much power Vrabel is going to have and he’s trying to quickly minimize the amount of voices in the room during key decision making processes.
On the flip side, it’ll be interesting to see if Vrabel has his own person who he’ll appoint in a Glaser-like role to take care of a lot of minute details that the head coach can’t be bogged down with on a daily basis.
Glaser is probably ‘the most interesting person in the world’ when it comes to all the secrets and behind-the-scenes stories that happened within the walls of Gillette Stadium over close to 30 years. Her departure the continuation of an ending era.