Brian Flores

Brian Francisco Flores (born February 24, 1981) is an American football coach who is the defensive coordinator for the Minnesota Vikings of the National Football League (NFL).

After attending Poly Prep Country Day School in Brooklyn, Flores played football at Boston College as a linebacker from 1999 through 2003.

An injury prevented him from playing in the NFL.

Flores grew up a fan of the New York Giants and New York Mets.

In 2004, at the age of 23, Flores joined the Patriots as a scouting assistant, the same year the franchise won its third Super Bowl title in Super Bowl XXXIX.

He became a pro scout in 2006 before getting promoted to Bill Belichick's coaching staff in 2008, serving as a special teams coaching assistant until the end of the 2009 season.

He began his NFL career with the New England Patriots, where he served as an assistant coach from 2008 to 2018.

Flores was New England's defensive playcaller during his final season coaching for the team, which concluded with a victory in Super Bowl LIII.

Flores' first season as head coach concluded with a 27–24 upset win over his former team, the Patriots, and was also the Dolphins' first road win over the Patriots since 2008.

His title was changed to assistant coach offense/special teams in 2010.

He was named defensive assistant in 2011, where Flores and the Patriots would appear in Super Bowl XLVI, but lost, 21–17, to the New York Giants in a rematch of Super Bowl XLII.

In his first season as a head coach, finishing 5–4 after beginning the season 0–7, and 4th/last place in the AFC East, Flores led the Dolphins to a 5–11 record.

In 2012, he was named safeties' coach.

In his four-year tenure as safeties' coach, the Patriots defeated the Seattle Seahawks to win their fourth Super Bowl title in Super Bowl XLIX.

The Dolphins went on to open the season with an 0–2 start with back-to-back losses against the division rivals New England Patriots and Buffalo Bills by the scores of 21–11 and 31–28 respectively, before winning their first game of the season against the Jacksonville Jaguars by a score of 31–13, also Miami's first win over Jacksonville since 2014.

It was also the Dolphins' first shutout win since November 2, 2014.

On October 20, Flores confirmed Tua would be the team's starting quarterback for Week 8, following their bye week, after allowing him to play the final seconds in the shutout win against the Jets.

Flores was named linebackers' coach ahead of the 2016 season.

That same year, Flores and the Patriots defeated the Atlanta Falcons in Super Bowl LI after the Patriots were down, 28–3, would rally to win the game, 34–28, in the first Super Bowl to be decided in overtime.

A day after the Patriots lost Super Bowl LII to the Philadelphia Eagles, long-time assistant Matt Patricia left to become the new head coach of the Detroit Lions, and Flores would take over the Patriots' defensive playcalling duties, but was not given the title of defensive coordinator.

In Flores' last game with the Patriots, Super Bowl LIII, they defeated the Los Angeles Rams, 13–3, in both a rematch of Super Bowl XXXVI and the lowest-scoring Super Bowl in NFL history.

They would also begin a 5-game winning streak for the first time since 2016, after beginning the season 0–2 and then 1–3.

During a Week 5 game against the defending NFC Champion San Francisco 49ers, the Dolphins blew out the Niners by a score of 43–17, which was their first time since 2015 scoring more than 40 points in a game, their first blowout win since December 3, 2017, and was also their first road win over the 49ers since 2004.

The Jets were led by Flores' predecessor and former Dolphins head coach Adam Gase, and that game was his first visit to Miami since the Dolphins fired him in December 2018.

Flores followed this by earning his second consecutive win against the Indianapolis Colts the following week, which was Miami's first road win since Week 2 of the 2018 season.

On a Week 6 contest against the division rival New York Jets, a 24–0 win, the Dolphins were the favorites to win for the first time since Week 16 of the 2018 season, a 17–7 loss versus the Jaguars.

The Dolphins were also favored to win for the first time under Flores' tenure as head coach.

Following the victory, he served as the head coach of the Miami Dolphins from 2019 to 2021.

On February 4, 2019, the day after the Patriots won their 6th Super Bowl title and after 15 years of serving as a Patriots assistant, Flores was hired as 12th head coach of the Miami Dolphins, becoming the fourth Latino in NFL history to become a head coach, after Ron Rivera, Tom Fears, and Tom Flores, the second former Belichick assistant to coach the team (the first being Nick Saban from 2005–2006).

Flores was also interviewed by the Green Bay Packers, Denver Broncos, and Cleveland Browns for each of their vacant head coaching spots.

The Dolphins also considered hiring Kansas City Chiefs offensive coordinator Eric Bieniemy and team assistants Darren Rizzi or Dowell Loggains prior to Flores' hiring.

On September 8, 2019, the Dolphins lost to the Baltimore Ravens, 59–10, in Flores' head coaching debut.

Again in Week 2, the Dolphins lost, 43–0, to Flores' former team, the defending Super Bowl champion New England Patriots, leaving the Dolphins outscored by a total of 163 points as of the team's bye week in Week 5, which had included blowout losses to the Dallas Cowboys and Los Angeles Chargers.

After a two-month winless start, Flores recorded his first win as a head coach in a 26–18 home victory over the division rival New York Jets on November 3, 2019.

Although unable to reach the playoffs, Flores helped lead Miami to consecutive winning seasons between 2020 and 2021, the franchise's first since 2003.

However, conflict with Dolphins management led to him being fired after the 2021 season.

Flores later filed a class-action lawsuit against the NFL, alleging racial discrimination in the league's treatment of minority coaches and executives.

Amid the lawsuit, he returned to assistant coaching and became the defensive coordinator of the Vikings in 2023.

Flores was born and raised in the Brownsville section of Brooklyn, New York City, to Honduran parents.

In his second season, Flores made the decision at the start of the 2020 season to start veteran quarterback Ryan Fitzpatrick over still injured rookie quarterback Tua Tagovailoa.