Oregon head coach Mario Cristobal is bringing back a former Oregon staffer to serve as the program’s player personnel director. As first reported by Scoop Duck, and subsequently reported by The Athletic, Oregon will hire Thomas Arends to serve as the player personnel director.
Arends is a former Oregon staffer, having filled the role of director of recruiting operations and high school relations under former Oregon head coach Chip Kelly. Prior to his return to Eugene, Oregon, Arends was the associate director of player personnel at Baylor.
Arends joined the Baylor program in 2017 after two years at Oregon under former head coach Mark Helfrich. Arends worked at Oregon under Kelly from 2009 through 2012 as a student assistant working on recruiting and working his way up on the staff upon graduation from Oregon.
It is fair to have some slight question marks about hiring anybody attached to recruiting efforts from the Chip Kelly era given how Kelly’s run with the Ducks came to an end with mild sanctions related to recruiting, but Arends is a native Oregonian who graduated from Oregon. Having someone that connected to the university and surrounding community certainly is a nice asset to have in the program whenever possible.