Brian Flores suing NFL, Giants over "sham" Rooney rule - "mistakenly" (?) sent Belichick text may be linchpin

NomarsFool

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BB and I aren't drinking buddies, but I'd be willing to be he wasn't pleased to have been dragged into Flores' lawsuit and especially probably didn't appreciate the "part of the problem' statement. So, it would seem unlikely to me there was a path for him to return to New England.
 

cornwalls@6

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I think a part of this may also be a case of Pittsburgh recognizing the talent, stepping up despite the circumstances and putting their money where their mouth (Rooney Rule) is.
Agree with this. Whatever else we think of them as Pats fans, they've arguably been the most enlightened franchise in the league on this issue. I actually hope there was a message sent from the league to member clubs to not let the suit prevent them from hiring Flores, but if there wasn't, or if the Steelers are defying an opposite message, good on them. Again.
 

mauf

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I shared this article recently in another thread. It’s a good (albeit long) primer on how NFL coaching contracts work.

https://www.si.com/nfl/2022/01/19/business-of-football-end-of-season-coaches-fired

In Flores’s case, whatever he earns with the Steelers will reduce dollar-for-dollar what the Dolphins owe him. The Steelers are, generally speaking, required to pay Flores fair value for his work. But Flores doesn’t need the coordinator title for his resume, so there’s no reason for him to do anything except put himself in the best situation.
 

Shaky Walton

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Flores commented on his suit, why he included the BB text and BB on a recent podcast.

Appearing on the I Am Athlete Podcast, Flores said Belichick’s message — where he apparently confused Flores with Brian Daboll on a text chain regarding the Giants’ head coaching job — was an honest mistake. He said he included the text in his lawsuit because he believes it strengthens his discrimination case against the league.

“I’m not mad,” Flores said. “He sent a text message to the wrong person. I’m certainly guilty of that.”

....

Podcast host Brandon Marshall called Belichick “the GOAT,” and Flores quickly agreed.

“I think the one thing people don’t know about Bill is he listens,” said Flores. “He listens. So if you have — and again, you’ve got to earn the right for him to listen — but if you have an idea, if you have a thought, if you have a person or there’s a matchup you think that we can win, a part in the game, he’ll listen. He may add something to it. He may throw it out. But he listens. I think that’s one of his greatest strengths.”

....

“To me, I thought it was specific to the lawsuit in that it confirmed a lot of the things that I thought were going on — that I think a lot of Black or minority coaches think are going on, it kind of confirmed it for me,” he added.
https://www.bostonglobe.com/2022/02/21/sports/brian-flores-says-hes-not-mad-bill-belichick-explains-why-he-made-text-exchange-public/
 

Mystic Merlin

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I can’t decide if Dolphins’ statement that Ross didn’t present Flores with an NDA/release is funnier than Arians emphasizing that he doesn’t actually use a red pen to write.
 

Ralphwiggum

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I've never seen or read a standard NFL head coaching contract, but if the way it works is if you are fired you only get your buyout if you sign a release, the Dolphins would have been nuts not to hold him to that provision. It's a bad look from a PR perspective and they are stupid for denying they did it, but you would never in a million years pay someone severance in exchange for a release and then waive the requirement they sign the release.
 

Jimbodandy

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I've never seen or read a standard NFL head coaching contract, but if the way it works is if you are fired you only get your buyout if you sign a release, the Dolphins would have been nuts not to hold him to that provision. It's a bad look from a PR perspective and they are stupid for denying they did it, but you would never in a million years pay someone severance in exchange for a release and then waive the requirement they sign the release.
I signed one of those after getting laid off five years ago. We all did (10% of the workforce). Quitclaim, non disparagement, etc. In exchange for a healthy severance, it was a no brainer. I still don't badmouth my former employer, even though there is cause.

Good for him in turning down the guaranteed cash in order to fight for this cause. All that does is make me believe in him even more.
 

JimD

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I read that Flores's contact only paid him $500,000 a year in base salary, but that he was earning in the vicinity of $3 million with incentives. Maybe if Ross wasn't such a cheapskate and trying to take advantage of his rookie HC and had offered a higher base, Flores wouldn't have been so quick to refuse to sign the NDA.
 

Bowhemian

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I signed one of those after getting laid off five years ago. We all did (10% of the workforce). Quitclaim, non disparagement, etc. In exchange for a healthy severance, it was a no brainer. I still don't badmouth my former employer, even though there is cause.

Good for him in turning down the guaranteed cash in order to fight for this cause. All that does is make me believe in him even more.
I got laid off from a major pharma company that rhymes with schmizer 11 years ago, and had to sign one of those in order to collect a very healthy severance. I had a lawyer friend look at it first, just to be safe, and he saw no issue with it.
 

kenneycb

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I read that Flores's contact only paid him $500,000 a year in base salary, but that he was earning in the vicinity of $3 million with incentives. Maybe if Ross wasn't such a cheapskate and trying to take advantage of his rookie HC and had offered a higher base, Flores wouldn't have been so quick to refuse to sign the NDA.
Do you know if his contract was markedly different than other first-time coaching contracts?
 

kenneycb

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Maybe. I'm more trying to determine if Ross is / isn't a cheapskate who is taking advantage of a rookie HC. I personally have no idea what is a standard contract for a regular head coach, let alone a rookie head coach.
 

Mystic Merlin

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I read that Flores's contact only paid him $500,000 a year in base salary, but that he was earning in the vicinity of $3 million with incentives. Maybe if Ross wasn't such a cheapskate and trying to take advantage of his rookie HC and had offered a higher base, Flores wouldn't have been so quick to refuse to sign the NDA.
Where did you read that? I’ve never heard of a head coach’s contract being so incentive-laden before, but, then again, who really knows what is in them? I think I have operated on the presumption that the annual value is guaranteed, as it is routinely reported when a coach is canned with years remaining on his deal that the team owes the balance of the value.
 

DennyDoyle'sBoil

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This doesn't seem to make sense. It's very standard for a severance agreement to have a release and nondisparagement.

But a severance agreement is where the employer of an at will employee gives up something in order to get those things -- usually it extends benefits or makes a severance payment. Flores seems to be in a different situation. He was not at will employee, I don't imagine. He had an employment contract. His right to payment would have been set by that contract and he should get what he is entitled to get under that contract without signing or being asked to sign something new.

I suppose it's possible that his employment contract could have a provision that he is only guaranteed payment for termination if he signs a release. That would be really weird, though, and possibly unenforceable. It also might be that there was a good faith dispute whether or not Flores was entitled to money under his employment contract and the Dolphins were saying they would resolve that dispute by paying him if he signed releases. That's pretty standard too.
 

Average Reds

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This doesn't seem to make sense. It's very standard for a severance agreement to have a release and nondisparagement.

But a severance agreement is where the employer of an at will employee gives up something in order to get those things -- usually it extends benefits or makes a severance payment. Flores seems to be in a different situation. He was not at will employee, I don't imagine. He had an employment contract. His right to payment would have been set by that contract and he should get what he is entitled to get under that contract without signing or being asked to sign something new.

I suppose it's possible that his employment contract could have a provision that he is only guaranteed payment for termination if he signs a release. That would be really weird, though, and possibly unenforceable. It also might be that there was a good faith dispute whether or not Flores was entitled to money under his employment contract and the Dolphins were saying they would resolve that dispute by paying him if he signed releases. That's pretty standard too.
Your questions on this are my questions. The whole thing is incredibly strange.

Having said that, if this is a standard contractual provision written into the employment contracts for NFL coaches (along with the provision about not participating in any lawsuits against the teams/the NFL) that would explain why Hue Jackson first supported Flores and then suddenly backtracked a day later.
 

DennyDoyle'sBoil

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Your questions on this are my questions. The whole thing is incredibly strange.

Having said that, if this is a standard contractual provision written into the employment contracts for NFL coaches (along with the provision about not participating in any lawsuits against the teams/the NFL) that would explain why Hue Jackson first supported Flores and then suddenly backtracked a day later.
I think we're missing a piece of the puzzle.

This would have to effectively be an agreement to agree. It would be hard to draft. "If we fire you, your remaining salary will be guaranteed unless you enter into a commercially reasonable release and nondisparagement agreement." I just don't think that would hold up and agreements to agree are really tough to write correctly.

Best guess is that maybe the contract has a provision that if you're fired for cause, the club doesn't have to pay you or can reduce the amount they pay you. I think I remember some suggestion like that with Urban Meyer. If the Dolphins were playing hardball and claiming that the termination was for cause, and Flores was claiming it wasn't, it would be very common for the parties to try to avoid arbitration by settling the dispute -- and the settlement likely would include a release. Still, just a guess.
 

mauf

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This doesn't seem to make sense. It's very standard for a severance agreement to have a release and nondisparagement.

But a severance agreement is where the employer of an at will employee gives up something in order to get those things -- usually it extends benefits or makes a severance payment. Flores seems to be in a different situation. He was not at will employee, I don't imagine. He had an employment contract. His right to payment would have been set by that contract and he should get what he is entitled to get under that contract without signing or being asked to sign something new.

I suppose it's possible that his employment contract could have a provision that he is only guaranteed payment for termination if he signs a release. That would be really weird, though, and possibly unenforceable. It also might be that there was a good faith dispute whether or not Flores was entitled to money under his employment contract and the Dolphins were saying they would resolve that dispute by paying him if he signed releases. That's pretty standard too.
My guess is that the Dolphins offered to pay Flores his remaining salary in a lump sum, thereby waiving his duty to mitigate damages (which per the article I linked upthread is standard in NFL coaching contracts), in exchange for Flores signing a severance agreement, which of course included confidentiality and non-disparagement clauses.
 

JimD

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Do you know if his contract was markedly different than other first-time coaching contracts?
Where did you read that? I’ve never heard of a head coach’s contract being so incentive-laden before, but, then again, who really knows what is in them? I think I have operated on the presumption that the annual value is guaranteed, as it is routinely reported when a coach is canned with years remaining on his deal that the team owes the balance of the value.
This article from last October indicated that only Matt Nagy had a lower base salary than Flores:

There are differing reports regarding Brian Flores’ salary — is it one of the lowest of any head coaches in the NFL?

Generally, NFL head coach salaries are not widely known. There is also more that goes into the deal than any reported salary. Teams will often include other bonuses, etc. that are not stated explicitly in the deal.

And from what we know of NFL head coach salaries in 2021, only one — Matt Nagy — earns less per year than Flores does on his contract. Flores reportedly earns just $500,000 per year as the Dolphins’ head coach according to some sources, including Sportscriber.

However, a report from NBC Chicago places Flores salary at around $3 million. One source tells PFN they believe Flores makes much more than the $500,000 number – as much as several million per year. There is the possibility that both numbers are true. Flores may have a “base salary” of $500,000, with incentives and other guarantees built-in on top of that that take the number into the $3 million range.

To put those numbers in some context, the next lowest-paid head coaches whose salaries are publicly reported are Kyle Shanahan and Mike Vrabel at around $3.5 million per year. Therefore, if the $500,000 number is correct, over the course of a fully-guaranteed five-year contract, Flores would earn less salary than Shanahan and Vrabel earn in a single season.
https://www.profootballnetwork.com/brian-flores-coaching-contract-details-salary-bonuses-dolphins/
 

Ralphwiggum

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I think we're missing a piece of the puzzle.

This would have to effectively be an agreement to agree. It would be hard to draft. "If we fire you, your remaining salary will be guaranteed unless you enter into a commercially reasonable release and nondisparagement agreement." I just don't think that would hold up and agreements to agree are really tough to write correctly.

Best guess is that maybe the contract has a provision that if you're fired for cause, the club doesn't have to pay you or can reduce the amount they pay you. I think I remember some suggestion like that with Urban Meyer. If the Dolphins were playing hardball and claiming that the termination was for cause, and Flores was claiming it wasn't, it would be very common for the parties to try to avoid arbitration by settling the dispute -- and the settlement likely would include a release. Still, just a guess.
You attach the NDA/release as an exhibit to the agreement and say that in the event of Flores being fired he only receives the remaining portion of his salary if he signs the attached release. I don't think it is difficult and/or unusual (though as I said above I've never seen a standard contract for an NFL coach). I also think it would be enforceable but even if it isn't most people are going to sign the release to get the payment.

Edit: I don't think this is an agreement to agree and complex commercial transactions have conditions attached to them that require one party or the other (or both) to sign additional agreements to receive all or a portion of their consideration all the time.
 

sodenj5

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I think the point being missed here is Flores stated publicly that Stephen Ross tried getting him to sign an NDA for his remaining salary.

This is sensationalist because Ross himself likely did not ask him to do this (Flores’ screenshots don’t prove anything in that regard) and this is also likely standard operating procedure in the termination of head coaches or high ranking executives.

In my mind, this is again undermining Flores’ credibility. This seems like him bending the truth a bit to make it seem like the owner didn’t want him speaking out about the things he’s publicly commented on.
 

mauf

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You attach the NDA/release as an exhibit to the agreement and say that in the event of Flores being fired he only receives the remaining portion of his salary if he signs the attached release. I don't think it is difficult and/or unusual (though as I said above I've never seen a standard contract for an NFL coach). I also think it would be enforceable but even if it isn't most people are going to sign the release to get the payment.

Edit: I don't think this is an agreement to agree and complex commercial transactions have conditions attached to them that require one party or the other (or both) to sign additional agreements to receive all or a portion of their consideration all the time.
Yeah, I too have seen employment agreements with future parachute payments or other severance conditioned upon signing a release at the time of termination of employment. I don’t see how it’s different than any other condition precedent to the employer’s obligation to pay, unless the company sandbags the employee by presenting an unusually onerous severance agreement at the time of termination (e.g., one containing previously undisclosed noncompete provisions), in which case the employee could argue fraud or bad faith.

Of course, a state could make a rule forbidding such arrangements, but since they typically only apply to executives (others generally don’t get advance promises of severance), I’d be surprised it any such rules exist.
 

Ralphwiggum

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In my mind, this is again undermining Flores’ credibility. This seems like him bending the truth a bit to make it seem like the owner didn’t want him speaking out about the things he’s publicly commented on.
Well, that's because you are a Dolphins fan and you want to believe Stephen Ross isn't the colossal shithead that Flores is making him out to be. Whether Ross personally presented him with the NDA is immaterial. If Flores' allegations are true, Ross was going to be one of the primary beneficiaries of Flores signing the agreement and taking the money to keep his mouth shut. Ross was a moron for denying that Flores was asked to do so if the thing he's hanging his hat on is that he personally didn't hand him the release.

This is as much a PR battle as anything else. The fact that Flores was willing to forego his buyout to push his lawsuit is a fact that works in his favor, regardless of whether Ross personally presented him with the release or whether it came from someone else in management.
 

sodenj5

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Well, that's because you are a Dolphins fan and you want to believe Stephen Ross isn't the colossal shithead that Flores is making him out to be. Whether Ross personally presented him with the NDA is immaterial. If Flores' allegations are true, Ross was going to be one of the primary beneficiaries of Flores signing the agreement and taking the money to keep his mouth shut. Ross was a moron for denying that Flores was asked to do so if the thing he's hanging his hat on is that he personally didn't hand him the release.

This is as much a PR battle as anything else. The fact that Flores was willing to forego his buyout to push his lawsuit is a fact that works in his favor, regardless of whether Ross personally presented him with the release or whether it came from someone else in management.
I don’t necessarily care about Ross. If he’s forced to sell the team, the franchise will carry on.

I agree that Flores leaving money on the table likely helps his case, but facts also matter.

Constructing the narrative that the billionaire white guy wanted to keep the lid on the black head coach he terminated plays a little more in the headlines than a standard operating procedure NDA upon termination.
 

Ralphwiggum

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I don’t necessarily care about Ross. If he’s forced to sell the team, the franchise will carry on.

I agree that Flores leaving money on the table likely helps his case, but facts also matter.

Constructing the narrative that the billionaire white guy wanted to keep the lid on the black head coach he terminated plays a little more in the headlines than a standard operating procedure NDA upon termination.
Right, which is why it was stupid for Ross to deny it based on semantics. "I didn't literally hand him the NDA, someone who works for me did" doesn't help Ross.

Edit: And to be clear, as I noted above, the Dolphins would have been dumb to pay Flores without requiring him to sign the agreement if that is what the contract provided for. I am disagreeing with the notion that pinning this on Ross personally hurts Flores, I don't think it does even a little.
 

Shelterdog

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I think the point being missed here is Flores stated publicly that Stephen Ross tried getting him to sign an NDA for his remaining salary.

This is sensationalist because Ross himself likely did not ask him to do this (Flores’ screenshots don’t prove anything in that regard) and this is also likely standard operating procedure in the termination of head coaches or high ranking executives.

In my mind, this is again undermining Flores’ credibility. This seems like him bending the truth a bit to make it seem like the owner didn’t want him speaking out about the things he’s publicly commented on.
You consistently keep finding that some perceived inconsistency by Flores undermines his credibility and look that's fine, it's all in the eye of the beholder, but you're also basically the only person I've seen following this story (press or fans) who is seeing it that way.
 

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Yeah, like I don't have a horse in this fight, but Stephen Ross doesn't need to hand deliver a document for it to be considered from him especially given that an NDA would benefit him more than anyone else in the organization. Flores indicating that a contractual provision is being forced from the guy in charge of paying that contract isn't exactly a credibility killer...

DDB's questions regarding the relevancy of the NDA to a payout in a contractual agreement are probably more in line with what I'm wondering, as well as how standard this really is.

There's a lot of murky details to be dragged out of this still
 

DennyDoyle'sBoil

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Yeah, I too have seen employment agreements with future parachute payments or other severance conditioned upon signing a release at the time of termination of employment. I don’t see how it’s different than any other condition precedent to the employer’s obligation to pay, unless the company sandbags the employee by presenting an unusually onerous severance agreement at the time of termination (e.g., one containing previously undisclosed noncompete provisions), in which case the employee could argue fraud or bad faith.

Of course, a state could make a rule forbidding such arrangements, but since they typically only apply to executives (others generally don’t get advance promises of severance), I’d be surprised it any such rules exist.
I've never seen that, but it's not my area. I don't know much about parachute payments but I think they are different from a defined term contract.

In a defined term contract such a provision, if enforceable, basically amounts to a contractual agreement to permit the company at its option to fire you for illegal reasons or withhold your contractual pay.
 

mauf

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I've never seen that, but it's not my area. I don't know much about parachute payments but I think they are different from a defined term contract.

In a defined term contract such a provision, if enforceable, basically amounts to a contractual agreement to permit the company at its option to fire you for illegal reasons or withhold your contractual pay.
I haven’t seen anything that says Flores won’t get paid the balance of his contract, subject to the usual duty to mitigate. My understanding is that the release would have been in exchange for a buyout — either some additional sum, or an acceleration of what he was owed under his employment contract (and hence, a waiver of his duty to mitigate). But I could totally be wrong on that.
 

DennyDoyle'sBoil

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Interesting that the NFL Defendants have hired Paul Weiss. I thought their go-to firms for litigation were Akin Gump (handled the Brady case) and Covington.

Perhaps this is a case of hiring the lawyer not the firm -- Lynch is a pretty inspired pick. But, our resident deflategate-ologists will surely eventually tumble to the fact that Paul Weiss was, of course, the law firm of their allegedly independent expert, Ted Wells.
 

ManicCompression

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You consistently keep finding that some perceived inconsistency by Flores undermines his credibility and look that's fine, it's all in the eye of the beholder, but you're also basically the only person I've seen following this story (press or fans) who is seeing it that way.
This isn't a fair statement as I'm sure a lot of folks feel this way but don't want to deal with the hassle of engaging with people who respond like this to criticism of Flores. BF is the same guy who's eager to hitch his coaching career to a serial sexual assaulter - it's possible he's not the most moral human being.

And that's not to say Flores is different from other NFL coaches - he's exactly like other NFL coaches, which is why a person can hold the simultaneous beliefs that the NFL sucks/has structural issues AND Brian Flores isn't the most sympathetic person.

The message of your post is "You're not conforming enough." As someone who follows the Dolphins closer than nearly anyone on the board, is his Soden's input is interesting to me even if I don't agree with it.
 

Shelterdog

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This isn't a fair statement as I'm sure a lot of folks feel this way but don't want to deal with the hassle of engaging with people who respond like this to criticism of Flores. BF is the same guy who's eager to hitch his coaching career to a serial sexual assaulter - it's possible he's not the most moral human being.

And that's not to say Flores is different from other NFL coaches - he's exactly like other NFL coaches, which is why a person can hold the simultaneous beliefs that the NFL sucks/has structural issues AND Brian Flores isn't the most sympathetic person.

The message of your post is "You're not conforming enough." As someone who follows the Dolphins closer than nearly anyone on the board, is his Soden's input is interesting to me even if I don't agree with it.
I think the message isn’t you’re not conforming enough, it’s “bro take off the teal colored glasses”. If you think that Flores is losing credibility because he said Ross gave him an NDA to sign When in fact it was Ross’s lawyer who delivered the document I can’t help you.
 

Ralphwiggum

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This isn't a fair statement as I'm sure a lot of folks feel this way but don't want to deal with the hassle of engaging with people who respond like this to criticism of Flores. BF is the same guy who's eager to hitch his coaching career to a serial sexual assaulter - it's possible he's not the most moral human being.
To what is the bolded referring to? Mike Tomlin is a serial sexual assaulter? Or are you referring to someone else? Asking honestly, I don't get the reference.

Edit: Oh you must mean Watson.
 

mauf

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This isn't a fair statement as I'm sure a lot of folks feel this way but don't want to deal with the hassle of engaging with people who respond like this to criticism of Flores. BF is the same guy who's eager to hitch his coaching career to a serial sexual assaulter - it's possible he's not the most moral human being.

And that's not to say Flores is different from other NFL coaches - he's exactly like other NFL coaches, which is why a person can hold the simultaneous beliefs that the NFL sucks/has structural issues AND Brian Flores isn't the most sympathetic person.

The message of your post is "You're not conforming enough." As someone who follows the Dolphins closer than nearly anyone on the board, is his Soden's input is interesting to me even if I don't agree with it.
I disagree.

I have enjoyed chatting with @sodenj5 about the Dolphins this season. As a fan of the team, he wasn’t sad to see Flores go. If I personally ran the Dolphins, I would’ve brought back Flores for another season to see if the team’s second-half turnaround was sustainable, but reasonable opinion can disagree.

But Ross didn’t say Flores got fired for leading a decent team to a 1-7 start, or even just the usual platitudes about new directions and so on — he said Flores wasn’t a team player. Or rather, we can infer that he gave other people his blessing to say that to various media outlets. And now we find out Flores declined to sign a release with confidentiality and non-disparagement provisions. It’s a bad look for Ross and the Dolphins, because it makes it look like he was retaliated against for not signing that release and agreeing to keep quiet. In sum, it reeks of pretext and therefore lends credence to Flores’s allegation that the real reasons for his firing were improper.

Seizing on the technicality of whether the owner of this closely-held business personally asked him to sign the release or not is totally a red herring. I will guarantee you that Stephen Ross was one of the released parties, even if the agreement would have been with the Dolphins and was presented to Flores by someone else in the organization (which is a totally standard practice — HR always handles that stuff).

So @sodenj5 is getting called out for what is a pretty silly position on this narrow issue. He’s a veteran here and understands as well as anyone that while everyone is entitled to their opinion, you’d best be able to defend your point of view in these parts, because there are a lot of smart people here who love a good argument. Nobody expects him to conform. And I’ll guarantee you he isn’t looking for a safe space or whatever.
 

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To what is the bolded referring to? Mike Tomlin is a serial sexual assaulter? Or are you referring to someone else? Asking honestly, I don't get the reference.
Watson.
Although saying an NFL coach is willing to have a talented player with a sketchy past on his team, particularly when that player has never been arrested or convicted , does t do much for me.
 

Ralphwiggum

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Watson.
Although saying an NFL coach is willing to have a talented player with a sketchy past on his team, particularly when that player has never been arrested or convicted , does t do much for me.
Yeah I figured it out after I posted. I'm not sure we can infer much of anything about Flores based on his reported interest in Watson, and it has fuck-all to do with his lawsuit.
 

Shelterdog

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Yeah I figured it out after I posted. I'm not sure we can infer much of anything about Flores based on his reported interest in Watson, and it has fuck-all to do with his lawsuit.
Yes-and contra manic compression I’m also quite willing to advance an unpopular opinion on Watson which is whether or not he is a serial sexual assaulter he isn’t going to jail, he’ll settle the cases fairly soon, his suspension for last year will be deemed sufficient by the league and he’s going to have a long and successful career during which no teams and precious few fans will give a fuck about the allegations. Although he probably won’t get to be in a lot of funny State Farm ads or host SNL
 

ManicCompression

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Yeah I figured it out after I posted. I'm not sure we can infer much of anything about Flores based on his reported interest in Watson, and it has fuck-all to do with his lawsuit.
You don't think you can infer much about a person from their interest in working with someone with dozens of allegations of sexual assault? Is this a principal you'll be extending to others? To your workplace?

It has a lot to do with the caliber of person Brian Flores is. As I said in my original post, doing whatever it takes to win isn't unique to Brian Flores, it's true of most every NFL coach. And that's fine but maybe I'm not going to believe everything that comes out of his mouth when I know that most coaches are egomaniacal bullshit artists.

Yes-and contra manic compression I’m also quite willing to advance an unpopular opinion on Watson which is whether or not he is a serial sexual assaulter he isn’t going to jail, he’ll settle the cases fairly soon, his suspension for last year will be deemed sufficient by the league and he’s going to have a long and successful career during which no teams and precious few fans will give a fuck about the allegations. Although he probably won’t get to be in a lot of funny State Farm ads or host SNL
So because it profits Flores to have Watson as his QB and fans will let it slide, we can ignore the ethics that go into the decision. And there's nothing to take away from the fact that Flores is willing to sacrifice his ethics to win. Makes total sense.

How are you contra me? I agree, Watson will probably settle. He'll probably find another team. He'll probably have a long career. I don't have to like and defend the eventual coach who chooses to employ him, and I certainly don't think it makes sense to laud a guy who so easily ignored Watson's behavior in an aggressive, well-reported push to acquire him. It's good that Flores is shining a lot on the NFL hiring practices, it's bad that he didn't care about Watson's abuse. Amazingly, I can believe both things and see Flores as complex human who's not completely trustworthy.
 

Dave Stapleton

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I suppose it's possible that his employment contract could have a provision that he is only guaranteed payment for termination if he signs a release. That would be really weird, though, and possibly unenforceable. It also might be that there was a good faith dispute whether or not Flores was entitled to money under his employment contract and the Dolphins were saying they would resolve that dispute by paying him if he signed releases. That's pretty standard too.
It's really not. Many severance agreements and employment agreements include language to this effect and often attached the very form of release that will be required as a condition to receive said payments.
 

Shelterdog

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You don't think you can infer much about a person from their interest in working with someone with dozens of allegations of sexual assault? Is this a principal you'll be extending to others? To your workplace?

It has a lot to do with the caliber of person Brian Flores is. As I said in my original post, doing whatever it takes to win isn't unique to Brian Flores, it's true of most every NFL coach. And that's fine but maybe I'm not going to believe everything that comes out of his mouth when I know that most coaches are egomaniacal bullshit artists.



So because it profits Flores to have Watson as his QB and fans will let it slide, we can ignore the ethics that go into the decision. And there's nothing to take away from the fact that Flores is willing to sacrifice his ethics to win. Makes total sense.

How are you contra me? I agree, Watson will probably settle. He'll probably find another team. He'll probably have a long career. I don't have to like and defend the eventual coach who chooses to employ him, and I certainly don't think it makes sense to laud a guy who so easily ignored Watson's behavior in an aggressive, well-reported push to acquire him. It's good that Flores is shining a lot on the NFL hiring practices, it's bad that he didn't care about Watson's abuse. Amazingly, I can believe both things and see Flores as complex human who's not completely trustworthy.
it’s contra you because you are accusing me of being a PC censor stomping out unpopular opinions.

Edit: I have no idea if Flores is trustworthy or not but I’m quite comfortable saying that things soden says are hurting Flores’s credibility are totally insignificant in my eyes and I suspect would also be in the eyes of most neutral fact finders.
 

Ralphwiggum

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You don't think you can infer much about a person from their interest in working with someone with dozens of allegations of sexual assault? Is this a principal you'll be extending to others? To your workplace?

It has a lot to do with the caliber of person Brian Flores is. As I said in my original post, doing whatever it takes to win isn't unique to Brian Flores, it's true of most every NFL coach. And that's fine but maybe I'm not going to believe everything that comes out of his mouth when I know that most coaches are egomaniacal bullshit artists.
No, I just don’t know how much we know about how much Flores was still pushing for Watson post-allegations. If he was that’s not a great look. It still has nothing to do with his lawsuit and I disagree that it speaks to his credibility. Team Flores is clearly treating this as a PR battle, however, so I agree we shouldnt accept everything they say at face value, but I still say splitting hairs over who exactly handed Flores the NDA is a bad look for Ross and the Dolphins.
 

ManicCompression

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it’s contra you because you are accusing me of being a PC censor stomping out unpopular opinions.

Edit: I have no idea if Flores is trustworthy or not but I’m quite comfortable saying that things soden says are hurting Flores’s credibility are totally insignificant in my eyes and I suspect would also be in the eyes of most neutral fact finders.
Now it seems like you're saying "change your opinion because it's not mine." Like, what is a neutral fact finder? Is that you? The fact that Flores was a longtime Patriots coach doesn't weigh into your opinion at all? If Rex Ryan was suing the Jets for unlawful termination and mixed up Woody Johnson with his lawyer in just the same way, that discrepancy wouldn't have the slightest significance to you?
 

mauf

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You don't think you can infer much about a person from their interest in working with someone with dozens of allegations of sexual assault? Is this a principal you'll be extending to others? To your workplace?

It has a lot to do with the caliber of person Brian Flores is. As I said in my original post, doing whatever it takes to win isn't unique to Brian Flores, it's true of most every NFL coach. And that's fine but maybe I'm not going to believe everything that comes out of his mouth when I know that most coaches are egomaniacal bullshit artists.



So because it profits Flores to have Watson as his QB and fans will let it slide, we can ignore the ethics that go into the decision. And there's nothing to take away from the fact that Flores is willing to sacrifice his ethics to win. Makes total sense.

How are you contra me? I agree, Watson will probably settle. He'll probably find another team. He'll probably have a long career. I don't have to like and defend the eventual coach who chooses to employ him, and I certainly don't think it makes sense to laud a guy who so easily ignored Watson's behavior in an aggressive, well-reported push to acquire him. It's good that Flores is shining a lot on the NFL hiring practices, it's bad that he didn't care about Watson's abuse. Amazingly, I can believe both things and see Flores as complex human who's not completely trustworthy.
How many NFL teams don’t have a gross person or two on their 53-man roster? It’s much more in the fans’ face when it’s a star QB like Watson or Rowthlisberger instead of some random player, but I’m not sure that matters much to the coach. Unfortunately, dealing with players like that is a prerequisite for the job. It’s a weird reason to find fault with Flores in particular.
 

Van Everyman

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We also heard Brian Flores was difficult to work with – until it came out that part of his “being difficult” was that he didn’t accept money from the owner to lose games.

Until I’ve seen otherwise, I’m just going to assume most of the bad things we’ve been told about Flores come from Ross’s camp.
 

ManicCompression

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No, I just don’t know how much we know about how much Flores was still pushing for Watson post-allegations. If he was that’s not a great look. It still has nothing to do with his lawsuit and I disagree that it speaks to his credibility. Team Flores is clearly treating this as a PR battle, however, so I agree we shouldnt accept everything they say at face value, but I still say splitting hairs over who exactly handed Flores the NDA is a bad look for Ross and the Dolphins.
How does the character of a person have nothing to do with their lawsuit? Or their credibility? Like not even to a slight degree?

How many NFL teams don’t have a gross person or two on their 53-man roster? It’s much more in the fans’ face when it’s a star QB like Watson or Rowthlisberger instead of some random player, but I’m not sure that matters much to the coach. Unfortunately, dealing with players like that is a prerequisite for the job. It’s a weird reason to find fault with Flores in particular.
I'm not finding particular fault with Flores, I'm making your same point - he's no different than other coaches. Dealing with players like that wouldn't be a pre-requisite if coaches had ethical principals, but they often don't because they're single-minded narcissists. So if Brian Flores is like other coaches... why do we assume he's this amazing, principled guy?