SAN FRANCISCO (Audacy) — Jon Gruden, a former Philadelphia Eagles assistant coach, will no longer coach the NFL's first-ever openly gay player — nor the rest of the Las Vegas Raiders — after homophobic emails came to light on Monday.
The New York Times reported on Monday that the Las Vegas Raiders head coach "casually and frequently unleashed misogynistic and homophobic language over several years to denigrate people around the game and to mock some of the league's momentous changes." About an hour after the paper's report, NFL Media's Tom Pelissero reported Gruden had decided to resign, which the Raiders later confirmed.
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In "several" messages, Gruden called NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell a "faggot," according to the paper. He also said that Goodell shouldn't have pressured then-Rams coach Jeff Fisher to draft "queers," referring to defensive end Michael Sam, who came out as gay in the lead-up to the 2014 NFL Draft.
Sam was cut by the Rams following the 2014 preseason. Raiders defensive end, West Chester native and former Penn State star Carl Nassib came out as gay in June, becoming the first active NFL player to do so.
"I learned a long time ago what makes a man different is what makes him great," Gruden wrote in a text message to the Las Vegas Review-Journal following Nassib’s announcement.
Neither Gruden nor the league responded to the New York Times’ request for comment on Monday.
Gruden was the Philadelphia Eagles' offensive coordinator from 1995-97, under then-Head Coach Ray Rhodes.
Gruden’s emails were uncovered in the NFL's workplace misconduct investigation into former Washington Football Team executive Bruce Allen, whom Gruden worked with during his first stint coaching the Raiders and his tenure with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
Gruden, working as an ESPN analyst at the time and using his private email address, routinely used racist, misogynistic, hompohobic and transphobic language in the emails. Last week, the Wall Street Journal reported on an email in which Gruden used a racist trope to describe the appearance of DeMaurice Smith, head of the NFL Players Association, during the 2011 NFL lockout.
KYW Newsradio's Jay Sorgi and Tim Jimenez contributed to this report.