The National Football League has hired Russell Reynolds Associates, one of the Big 5 global search firms, to lead the process of hiring a successor to General Counsel Jeff Pash, whom the league revealed in May will retire when his successor is on board.

Russell Reynolds positions itself as a thought leader in professional sports and has a long line of high-profile assignments in that industry under its belt, such as the one that led to the 2019 promotion of Richard Masters to CEO of the London-based Premier League, the world’s top pro soccer organization.