Brian Flores’ legal team is looking into the hiring practices of nearly every team in the NFL as part of his long-running discrimination suit against the league.
A court filing shows that the Minnesota Vikings defensive coordinator’s attorneys have subpoenaed 25 teams — in addition to the six teams that he is suing — and served more than 1,000 discovery requests, Front Office Sports first reported on Tuesday. ESPN and The Athletic confirmed the information.
Flores, who is Black, argues in his lawsuit that he was treated unfairly due to his race after being fired as head coach of the Miami Dolphins in January 2022.
He filed a civil suit against the NFL and the Dolphins, New York Giants and Denver Broncos in February 2022, arguing that those teams were “rife with racism” in their hiring and promotion of Black coaches.
Flores later added fellow coaches Steve Wilks and Ray Horton as co-plaintiffs, as well as the Arizona Cardinals, Tennessee Titans and Houston Texans as defendants.
Lawyers representing the defendants filed a memo last week with U.S. District Judge Valerie Caproni, the federal judge overseeing the case, that accused Flores’ team of filing “punishingly overbroad” discovery requests from their clients and “25 non-party clubs.”
The memo called the document requests a delay tactic designed to interfere with the defendants’ motions to dismiss the case altogether.
Flores, 45, is scheduled to file a third amended complaint on Wednesday. Motions to dismiss will be heard on June 5, with more briefs scheduled later this summer.
The Dolphins fired Flores after consecutive winning seasons. He was 24-25 as Miami’s head coach. He worked as a defensive assistant and linebackers coach with the Pittsburgh Steelers in 2022 before taking the DC post in Minnesota in 2023.
–Field Level Media
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