Brian Flores Suing The NFL & NY Giants, Alleging Racism During Coaching Search

The Rooney Rule is a rule that has been put into place by the National Football League that requires league teams to interview ethnic-minority candidates for head coaching and senior football operation jobs in hopes of offering a fair shot to said minorities and create diversity within the league.

One the first day of Black History Month, former Dolphins head coach Brian Flores is alleging people in power within the league have tossed this by the wayside, at his expense.

Flores, who was fired by the Dolphins after a second consecutive winning season, was a consensus hot target for head coaching vacancies around the league. Flores was scheduled for interviews with numerous teams including the New York Giants. Only issue? The Giants has a handshake agreement to hire a coach before they even interviewed him.

In a lawsuit filed in the Manhattan Federal Court against the National Football League alleging the league “remains rife with racism” in a 58-page document, Flores exposes text messages sent by Patriots head coach Bill Belichick to him, where he congratulated him on being the “their [Buffalo’s] guy”. Flores responded confused stating he hadn’t even interviewed yet, to which Belichick responded saying he thought he was speaking to Brian Dabol, not Brian Flores.

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The Giants announced the hiring of Daboll on January 29.

Flores is seeking to represent a class of Black general managers, head coaches, offensive and defensive coordinators and quarterbacks coaches, as well as Black candidates for those positions. He’s asked a federal judge in New York to award unspecified damages and order changes to remedy the leagues alleged discriminatory practices.

Flores has stated that he understands this suit may cost him his coaching career.