Minnesota Vikings

George Paton still the assistant general manager for the Minnesota Vikings

Updated Mar. 4, 2020 9:26 p.m. ET

Fansided, Adam Carlson/FanSided via The Viking Age

The Minnesota Vikings dodged some bullets as two of the teams most likely to pull assistant general manager George Paton away hired other candidates.

Recently, The Viking Age published a piece on how it might be difficult for the Minnesota Vikings to retain assistant general manager George Paton considering some of the juicy offers out there to make him a general manager of a different franchise.

Paton was linked as a top choice to earn the general manager job in San Francisco and an interesting choice to take over the front office for the talented, yet struggling, Indianapolis Colts organization.

The picture cleared up quickly concerning Paton’s future with the Vikings. The San Francisco 49ers made a shocking move by hiring someone with no front office experience as their new general manager, giving the job to former player John Lynch.

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Meanwhile, the Indianapolis Colts made a decision on their general manager on the same day. They decided to choose someone with some experience, enticing Kansas City Chiefs director of football relations to become their leader in the front office.

Paton’s connection with Vikings general manager Rick Spielman is a strong one. However, it would have been hard to blame the assistant for choosing a bigger job with a different organization since there isn’t any more room for advancement in Minnesota.

The fact that the 49ers went with such a surprising choice for their hire instead of a proven commodity with a lot of experience is a bold one, but a call that should have Vikings fans happy considering that it will likely keep Paton with the franchise.

Eventually, the right offer and situation will come along for George Paton and he will be enticed to leave the Minnesota Vikings, but that doesn’t look to be happening heading into the 2017 NFL season.