Last week, former Miami Dolphins head coach Brian Flores may have finally forced the NFL into an unprecedented reckoning with its inherent racism.
In his scathing 58-page lawsuit filed against the league and its 32 teams, Flores describes the racial discrimination that runs rampant to its core. Along with claims that Miami forced him out for refusing to participate in the owner Stephen Ross’ desired free agency tampering and match-fixing, Flores also alleges that he was subject to “sham interview[s]” by the Denver Broncos and New York Giants.
Soon after, former Cincinnati Bengals head coach Marvin Lewis implicated the Carolina Panthers as yet another team that offered a sham interview—potentially feigning interest in him after they had reportedly already settled on John Fox. Additionally, back in 2019, NFL analyst Jim Trotter noted that Clemson offensive coordinator Tony Elliott turned down a chance to speak with the Panthers because he “didn’t view it as a legitimate interview.”
All three coaches insist that teams may have offered them pseudo meetings in an effort to skirt the league’s rule intended to make the hiring process fairer for minority candidates. That standard—known as the Rooney Rule—was instituted in 2003 to improve the diversity and fairness in teams’ coaching and executive staffs. And at least initially, it worked.
In 2002, before the league passed the rule, teams had hired just seven head coaches of color in the league’s 80 years of existence. Now, that number is up to 37 head coaches. Just five seasons ago, the league tied a previous all-time high from 2011 with a quarter of all the league’s head coaches being of color.
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Still, some critics have seen the Flores lawsuit as further justification to abolish the Rooney Rule. But in the same breath, repealing an inherently good precedent based solely on how it’s abused makes little sense.
Instead, the solution is not to abandon one of the only reasons that franchises consider Black candidates for coaching positions. Rather, the NFL should focus on improving it.
Despite the progress driven by the Rooney Rule thus far, the NFL’s coaching staff still does not accurately represent its players, with 70.1 percent of players identifying as of color. There are also still blatant instances of racial discrimination.
The Giants, Broncos and Panthers have all allegedly conducted bogus interviews with a Black candidate before hiring the white coach they wanted all along. Worse, they alienate Black candidates from their positions by taking advantage of systemically-instituted stereotypes based on race.
Flores, for instance, was allegedly labeled “noncompliant and difficult to work with” when he refused to follow the immoral and illegal orders issued by his higher-ups. More specifically—meeting with free agent Tom Brady before the legal tampering period.
Naturally, the NFL should take serious allegations of racial discrimination in its league seriously, right? However, even though an internal investigation is the least the league could do, the NFL and the Dolphins’ initial reflex was to deny all of Flores’ claims outright.
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If they did read the pages, they would see that Flores makes a few reasonable suggestions to reform the hiring practices beyond the Rooney Rule, many of which could truly help to reduce the league’s glaring issues with discrimination. These three concrete steps, all of which are mentioned in the lawsuit, could have a significant impact in advancing diversity, equity and inclusion:
1. Create and fund a committee to source Black investors for majority ownership stakes in NFL teams
Much like for head coaches, ownership in the NFL is far from diverse. In fact, not one of the league’s 32 owners is of color. But just as there are plenty of Black head coaches qualified for the job, there are also plenty of Black investors who are able to take majority ownership stakes in teams.
The problem is the evident lack of inclusion in ownership circles. By encouraging Black investors to lead organizations at the very top, the NFL can “increase the influence of Black individuals in hiring and termination decisions,” and it would not be a stretch to argue that the move would increase diversity in hiring general managers, coaches and coordinators.
2. Allow Black players and coaches to help interview front office candidates
One of the most common subconscious biases is for a manager to hire a candidate who is just like himself. For example, when asked about his decision to hire Matt Rhule, Panthers owner David Tepper said that “he dresses like me, so I have to love the guy,” later adding that “I was a short-order cook, he was a short-order cook.”
By allowing select Black players and coaches to have a voice in the hiring process, the league will not only level the playing field of subconscious biases in the interview room, but it will also “ensure [the] diversity of decision-making” in staffing decisions.
3. Create and fund a training program for lower-level Black coaches who demonstrate an aptitude for coaching and an interest in advancing to a coordinator position
With some exceptions, there is a strong negative correlation between front office rank and racial diversity. From the top-down—owner, general manager, head coach, positional coaches, support staff, players—the league progressively becomes more diverse.
Take the Panthers, again, for example. Tepper is white, general manager Scott Fitterer is white, Rhule is white and all three of Carolina’s coordinators are white. However, the team has multiple positional coaches that identify as of color and plenty of lower-level front office staff that identify with either a minority race or gender.
By promoting the advancement of these lower-level coaches and staff to positions with a more influential voice in hiring decisions, the NFL will increase the representation of its players in front offices across the league.
Although Flores’ lawsuit brought this issue to light once again, the NFL has suffered from blatant racial discrimination for years. With the potential push from these three guidelines, the NFL may finally start to become an inclusive space for diverse races and genders.
Until that happens, though, the league’s front offices might continue to be some of the least diverse rooms in American sports.
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