Mike Florio Is Furious With The 'Assault on DEI' In America, Wants More DEI in the NFL

NBC Sports writer Mike Florio is fed up with the "current assault on DEI" in America. He called Donald Trump's executive orders ending federal support for DEI and U.S. corporations subsequently pulling back on DEI initiatives "as ingenious as it is insidious."

Insidious, huh?

Specifically, Florio is angered by the lack of DEI in the NFL. He cited a report from USA Today that white men have filled the last 29 vacant offensive coordinator positions.

"With two of the supposedly co-equal branches of government not currently in the mood to even acknowledge such issues, it leaves the task of ensuring fairness to the courts," Florio opines.

In addition, he claims a "pocket of fringe media" will respond to his outrage by asking, as he writes it: "wHeRe aRe aLL tHe wHiTe cOrNErBacKs?"

He doesn't want to hear about the NFL franchise and college universities that continue to dismiss white players as not athletic enough to play defensive skill positions.

By the way, who cringed more when Cooper DeJean picked six Patrick Mahomes in the Super Bowl: Florio or Bomani Jones? 

We vote Mike Florio.

Interestingly, Florio admits in the article that employment decisions in the NFL should "be based solely on merit." Well, that just doesn't add up. 

DEI is the antithesis of merit. At its core, DEI is a concept that encourages and often incentivizes employers to hire non-white male candidates, even if they are less qualified than other potential white male candidates.

One cannot support both DEI and a merit-based system. You either support hiring candidates based on skin color, gender, or sexual orientation, or you support hiring the best candidate, regardless of those three factors.

And until 2020, Mike Florio was no fan of DEI.

Remember, Florio had never hired a black writer for ProFootballTalk until a feud with OutKick's Clay Travis and Jason Whitlock when Florio erroneously accused us of never hiring a woman (the editor of OutKick for years before 2020 was a woman). Clay responded by correcting the record and pointing out the lack of diversity at PFT, of which Florio still owns 100%.

Shortly after Clay's post, Florio hired Myles Simmons, the first black writer in ProFootballTalk's history.

Does that make Florio a racist trying to cover his tracks? No, not on the surface. There are a multitude of factors that go into hiring for positions of high interest and limited openings.

Moreover, Florio's argument that black coaches are relegated to the defensive side, thus hurting their chances of becoming head coaches, is not supported by reality.

A defensive background didn't hurt Aaron Glenn, DeMeco Ryans, and Jerod Mayo's head coaching prospects over the past two seasons. 

Ultimately, limousine liberals like Mike Florio have found it increasingly difficult to call NFL owners racists over head coaching or quarterbacking decisions, so they've been on the prowl to find another storyline over which they can feign outrage. 

They settled on offensive coordinators.

But you know what's got us in a tizzy? Mike Florio has never hired a trans-Hispanic social media director at ProFootballTalk. It might be time for PFT to strengthen its DEI initiatives on behalf of all trans Hispanics.