Minnesota Vikings defensive coordinator Brian Flores can take his discrimination cases against the NFL, Giants, Denver Broncos and Houston Texans to an open federal court in front of a jury, a federal appeals court reaffirmed Thursday.
The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a March 2023 ruling by U.S. District Judge Valerie Caproni that rejected the NFL’s attempt to force Flores’ civil claims into arbitration overseen by league commissioner Roger Goodell.
The decision written by Circuit Judge Jose A. Cabranes said the NFL constitution’s arbitration provision “contractually provides for no independent arbitral forum, no bilateral dispute resolution, and no procedure.”
“Instead, it offends basic presumptions of our arbitration jurisprudence” by forcing claims to be decided by the NFL’s “principal executive officer,” the appeals court said.
Attorneys Douglas H. Wigdor, David E. Gottlieb and John Elefterakis said “the significance of the Second Circuit’s decision cannot be overstated.”
“For too long, the NFL has relied on a fundamentally biased and unfair arbitration process — even in cases involving serious claims of discrimination,” the attorneys said. “This ruling sends a clear message: that practice must end. This is a victory not only for NFL employees, but for workers across the country—and for anyone who believes in transparency, accountability and justice.”
NFL spokesperson Brian McCarthy said: “We respectfully disagree with the panel’s ruling, and will be seeking further review.”
The NFL is having a tough week in court. The Nevada Supreme Court just ruled against the NFL’s effort to force former coach Jon Gruden’s claims against the league and Roger Goodell into arbitration, as well.
Flores originally sued the NFL and several teams in Feb. 2022, alleging that the league was “rife with racism,” particularly in its hiring and promotion of Black coaches. Two other coaches later joined the lawsuit, which sought to proceed as a class action, but Caproni ruled that their claims could go to arbitration based on the language in contracts they signed with teams.
Specific to the Giants, Flores’ lawsuit alleges that the Giants gave him a sham interview for their head coaching vacancy in Jan. 2022 prior to announcing Brian Daboll as their head coach.
Flores alleges that then Patriots head coach Bill Belichick sent him a text message two days before his Giants interview that was really intended for Daboll that read: “I hear from Buffalo and NYG that you are their guy.”
Giants co-owner John Mara said “the allegations are false” in March 2022 at the NFL owners’ meetings in Palm Beach, Fla.
“We’re very comfortable with our hiring process, and it was a fair process, and we ended up making the decision we made based on a lot of factors, none of which had to do with race,” Mara said in 2022.
Mara also said no one from the Giants, including Mara himself, had spoken to Belichick about the hiring process.
“I haven’t spoken or communicated with Bill since we played them in the preseason last summer,” Mara said in 2022, “and to my knowledge, nobody in our organization communicated with him.”
Rich Hernandez, Esq. is the Giants’ current senior vice president and general counsel. He was promoted to replace former general counsel William Heller in March 2023.
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