While saying he has brought “serious issues” to the forefront, the New York Giants on Thursday fired back against longtime NFL assistant coach Brian Flores, the recently fired head coach of the Miami Dolphins who has brought suit against the NFL as a whole and multiple teams.
In a statement released by the organization, the Giants not only struck back against Flores’ allegations that their consideration of him constituted “a sham interview,” but they brought their receipts.
“The specific claims against the Giants and Mr. Flores’ allegations about the legitimacy of his candidacy for our head coach position are disturbing and simply false,” the Giants said.
The Denver Broncos and president John Elway likewise blasted Flores in a statement.
“I interviewed Brian in good faith, giving him the same consideration and opportunity as every other candidate for our head coaching position in 2019,” Elway said, in part, in the statement.
As it pertained to specific details for the candidacy of Flores, as well as that of the franchise’s ultimate hire, Brian Daboll, the Giants slammed any decision to base allegations off a text exchange with Bill Belichick and also noted that New York’s John Mara, part of the franchise’s owning family, had spoken to Flores just days after he was fired in Miami.
“The text exchange (between Belichick and Flores) occurred the day before Coach Daboll’s in-person interview even took place,” the Giants noted. “Giants’ ownership would never hire a head coach based only on a 20-minute Zoom interview, which is all that Mr. Daboll had at that point. …
“John Mara called Mr. Flores two days after he was dismissed in Miami. Mr. Mara expressed to Mr. Flores in that January 12 call that once we had our new general manager in place, we would begin the process of hiring our head coach and we wanted to meet with Mr. Flores because we considered him a serious candidate for the position.”
The Giants also posted the exact itinerary of Flores’ January 27 meeting with team personnel.
On behalf of the Broncos, Elway said in the statement that he felt the need to defend his personal character as well as the Broncos’ interview process that ultimately led to the hiring of Vic Fangio, who was fired last month after three seasons atop the franchise.
Flores had questioned whether Elway and the Broncos had taken seriously the candidacy of Flores for the job three years ago, and Flores likewise questioned Elway’s mental composition at the time of the interview.
“It’s unfortunate and shocking to learn for the first time this week that Brian felt differently about our interview with him,” Elway said. “For Brian to make an assumption about my appearance and state of mind early that morning was subjective, hurtful and just plain wrong.
“IF I appeared ‘disheveled,’ as (Flores) claimed, it was because we had flown in during the middle of the night – immediately following another interview in Denver – and were going on a few hours of sleep to meet the only window provided to us.
“I interviewed Brian in good faith, giving him the same consideration and opportunity as every other candidate for our head coaching position in 2019.”