Three Black men who are current or former National Football League coaches sued the NFL and several member teams for racial discrimination. Brian Flores, Steve Wilks and Ray Horton v The National Football League; New York Football Giants, Inc, d/b/a New York Giants et al, No. 22-CV-0871 (VEC), (S.D.N.Y. Mar. 1, 2023).
Each man had an employment contract with the team he coached. Brian Flores had an employment contract with the Miami Dolphins, Steve Wilks had an employment contract with the Arizona Cardinals, and Ray Horton had an employment contract with the Tennessee Titans..
Flores was never employed by and therefore did not have employment contracts with the Denver Broncos, New York Giants or Houston Texans.
Each employment contract provided for mandatory arbitration of employment disputes.
As described by the Judge, Flores’ four specific claims are:
While Flores was head coach of Miami Dolphins, owner Stephen Ross attempted to bribe him to lose games to get an advantage in the next year’s draft and Ross also attempted to get him to recruit a prominent quarterback in violation of League tampering rules. When he refused both requests, he alleges he was stigmatized as an “angry Black man” and ultimately fired.
The Denver Broncos interviewed Flores in 2019 for the head coach position solely to satisfy the Rooney Rule that any NFL team looking to hire a head coach must interview at least one minority candidate but did not actually consider him for the head coach position.
In January 2022 the New York Giants invited Flores to interview for head coach but had already selected Brian DaBoll.
The Houston Texans removed Flores from consideration as head coach solely in retaliation for filing the instant lawsuit.
Steve Wilks alleges the Arizona Cardinals hired him as a bridge coach meaning he was not given a meaningful opportunity to succeed and was simply keeping the seat warm until a new coach was brought in and that he was wrongfully fired as the scapegoat for team failures attributable to other individuals.
Ray Horton alleges that in January 2016 while he was the Tennessee Titans’ defensive coordinator, he interviewed to be the Titans’ head coach but that the Titans had already decided to hire Mike Mularkey, a white man.
On a motion to compel, the court compelled arbitration on all causes except Flores claims against the New York Giants, the Houston Texans and the Denver Broncos and claims against the NFL related to these claims.
Flores claims against New York, Houston, Denver (and against the NFL on these causes) were not compelled to arbitration because he was never employed by these teams and therefore did not have a contract compelling arbitration of disputes with these teams.
The NFL was deemed to be a joint employer with each individual team and therefore compelled to arbitration on the disputes going to arbitration and remained in court on the disputes remaining in court.
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