It is fun to watch leftists emulate in their own self-made conflagrations. Brain Flores is the latest example of someone who can take a great thing and somehow find fault with white people. Imagine: You’re in your thirties, you’re an NFL head coach, and you nevertheless decide that white supremacy is holding you back. What a loser.
Best yet in this racial-grifting saga. The claim that Flores was being racially discriminated against by several NFL teams completely fell apart when it was revealed earlier this week that he had been passed over for a head coaching gig by – wait for it – a different black guy! So much racism.
A quick recap: Flores coached the Miami Dolphins for two years. He did okay, but rumors swirled that he butted heads with management and wasn’t easy to work with. After he was let go, he interviewed with the New York Giants, where he claims he was merely a pawn in the process (more on that in a moment) and that the Giants never intended to hire him. He filed a huge lawsuit against multiple teams alleging racism, even while he was still doing the interview circuit with other teams. It’s quite likely he would have been hired somewhere.
Everything changed, however, when he went full Colin Kaepernick. In the span of a few weeks, he went from being an up-and-coming new coaching talent to being persona non grata on account of his toxicity, untrustworthiness, and lack of credibility.
Rooted in this Flores nonsense is the affirmative action process known as the Rooney Rule in the NFL. Simply put, the Rooney Rule states that all NFL teams must interview at least two candidates of color for head coaching vacancies. You know, because it’s racist if there aren’t more black head coaches. Is it racist against whites if over 70% of the league’s players are black? No one bothers to ask.
In all, three different teams were named in Flores’ suit: His former employer in Miami, his prospective employer in New York, and a failed interview in Denver circa 2019. CNN breaks down all three:
“Flores also says Dolphins’ owner Stephen Ross offered to pay Flores to purposely lose games in order to secure a higher pick in the NFL draft and encouraged Flores to purposely violate league tampering rules. Flores says when he refused, Ross then led a campaign to treat Flores with “disdain and held out as someone who was noncompliant and difficult to work with…”
“Flores, who is Black, says in his lawsuit that the Giants interviewed him for their vacant head coaching job under disingenuous circumstances, as Flores had found out three days before his interview that the Giants had already decided to hire Brian Daboll…”
“Flores’ lawsuit claims that in 2019, he was subjected to another “sham interview,” this one with the Denver Broncos. Flores says that “Broncos’ then-General Manager John Elway, President and Chief Executive Officer Joe Ellis and others showed up an hour late to the interview” and adds that the Broncos’ delegation “looked completely disheveled, and it was obvious that they had been drinking heavily the night before.”
Incredibly, the fact that the Rooney Rule exists at all is the reason Flores is so upset. If he felt like the interview was a sham, maybe he should direct his anger at the wokesters who implemented it in the first place. I wouldn’t want to waste my time being one of two mandatory candidates just to check off a box for the NFL’s New York headquarters. In that regard, I don’t blame Flores at all. However, let’s not pretend that it’s the Giants’, Broncos’, or any other team’s fault for abiding by a law they don’t want either.
Here’s a crazy thought: NFL teams want to win and they will hire the best players and coaches to make that happen.
So, here’s a crazy idea as follow-up: How about we let the NFL build out rosters in order to make that happen? The free market is a lot more fair than arbitrary quotas.
As with all affirmative hiring practices and leftist ideas in general, the very people they purport to care about and help are most likely to fall victim to the corrosive ideology. Were it not for the Rooney Rule, Brian Flores would have been given interviews for the sole purpose of finding the best next head coach. Instead, everyone’s time was wasted because leftist idiots don’t know or care to learn how the world really works.
Hailey Sanibel writes regularly with other pro-freedom authors at The Blue State Conservative.