Brian Flores wants back on the head coaching carousel.
The current Vikings defense coordinator said on “The Adam Schefter Podcast” this week that he’s looking to once again be the leader on an NFL team’s sideline.
“Look, there’s only 32 of these jobs, so I would certainly want to be a head coach in this league again,” Flores said.
After serving as an assistant coach for the Patriots for more than a decade, Flores was the head coach of the Dolphins for three seasons, going 24-25 before being fired after a 9-8 campaign in 2021.
Flores described his time in Miami as a learning experience.
“I think a lot of people view the Miami experience as [if] I see it as all negative,” he said. “I really don’t. I think it was a great experience for me and my family. There’s so much that I learned during my time there that’s made me a much, much better coach today … better in a lot of areas. And just in reflecting on that time, there’s things that obviously I would like to do better, but there’s also a lot of things that I would continue to implement.
“But it wasn’t all negative. Obviously, there was some things that I would have done better, but I thought it was a great experience and I’ve really, really come out of it in [a] positive way and excited about where I am now. I really learned a lot from it.”
In the weeks after his firing by Miami, Flores filed a class-action lawsuit against the league and all 32 teams, alleging discrimination against black head coaches and executives.
Flores said over the summer that he’s had no requests to be interviewed for head coaching jobs, though he said he wasn’t sure if the lawsuit had any part of that.
“And I don’t really have control over that situation,” Flores said, via Kevin Seifert of ESPN.com. “I will say that I’m very happy where I am. It’s been a great offseason. I haven’t spent this much time with my family in a while.”
Flores spent the 2022 season as a defensive assistant under Mike Tomlin in Pittsburgh before landing the defensive coordinator job with the Vikings in 2023.
This year, Flores has been the architect of arguably the best defense in football.
Through 10 weeks, Minnesota ranks sixth in yards allowed per play, third in points allowed per game, and first in DVOA.
The Vikings have been perhaps the most surprising team in the NFL behind Flores’ defense, going 7-2 heading into Week 11, tied with the Eagles for the second-best record in the NFC.
Flores’ bounce-back season comes after his former quarterback Tua Tagvailoa ripped him during an appearance on the “Dan Le Batard Show” in August, calling him a “terrible person.”
