The document that the NFL and search firm Korn Ferry did not want the public to see has now been revealed.
The item is attached to a supplemental complaint filed by Flores against the Miami Dolphins, in his lawsuit that was first filed in February 2022.
The document in question, which is attached as an exhibit to the supplemental complaint, contains a summary of Flores’s “strengths and weaknesses,” as prepared by Korn Ferry.
The document includes this assessment as one of seven bullet points in the “weaknesses” category: “Needs someone strong at the top to reign \[sic\] in some of his worst behavior. He once threatened violence to his GM and made irrational demands during an ownership meeting**.** One long-time senior team executive said, ‘_He may have changed since, but he was the worst hiring decision we’ve ever made.’_ Another President of a club refused to talk about him.” (Emphasis added.)
Another bullet point says this: “**Ongoing litigation may be a distraction**.” (Emphasis in original.)
The Raiders, who received that assessment from Korn Ferry, did not interview Flores for the team’s head-coaching vacancy on which Korn Ferry was consulting.
The supplemental complaint filed by Flores accuses the Dolphins of making the statement calling him “the worst hiring decision we’ve ever made.”
Flores’s lawyers at the firm of Wigdor LLP and Elefterakis, Elefterakis & Panek issued a statement on Tuesday, a copy of which PFT has received.
“The recently unsealed documents demonstrate two unfortunate, but unsurprising, realities,” they said. “First, that Mr. Flores’ decision to hold the league and its teams accountable for systemic race discrimination has been met with unlawful retaliation. Second, discrimination continues to play a significant role in the hiring process for NFL Head Coaches, as evidenced by the fact that the candidate profile prepared for the Raiders leans heavily on racial stereotypes. We and Mr. Flores are committed to eradicating the institutional racism and retaliation that permeates the league, its teams and their partners.”
In our view, characterizing Flores as “the worst hiring decision we’ve ever made” makes it much more difficult for Flores to get a head-coaching job, and it opens the door to the question of whether that assessment was motivated in whole or in part by Flores exercising his prerogative to challenge the decision to fire him via the filing of a lawsuit.
Given the casual manner in which these statements appeared in a formal summary of Flores prepared by Korn Ferry, it’s fair to wonder how many other breadcrumbs his lawyers will uncover in the discovery process — especially once they get their hands (and eyes) on informal communications among owners and executives, such as emails and text messages.