Former Stanford Head Coach Troy Taylor Suing ESPN

Just when we thought we have heard the end of the Troy Taylor situation, things are now going from bad to worse. On Thursday, it was revealed that Taylor is suing ESPN for defamation. This comes months after he was fired from his role as the Stanford football head coach for allegations of a toxic workplace environment.

Taylor is suing because he believes that ESPN published the story that included 'repeated defamatory remarks about Taylor' and that they knew full well that the allegations were false--claiming that the story was published in order to 'smear Taylor's reputations and injure him in his profession.' The suit was filed in the Northern District of California, with Taylor also suing ESPN reporter, Xuan Thai.

When the ESPN article was first released on March 19, Stanford football general manager Andrew Luck initially stood by Taylor but after extensive due diligence and feeling that the program needed a 'reset,' Luck fired Taylor six days after the report came out, ending his two season stint with the Cardinal.

The toxic workplace allegations in question claimed that Taylor 'bullied and belittled female athletic staffers' and alluded to a pair of third-party investigations that were in both 2023 and '24 after multiple employees filed a complaint about Taylor's behavior towards them.

But in Taylor's complaint, he alleges that a follow-up piece published by ESPN later on said that Stanford's initial investigation began “in response to a single complainant who alleged gender bias and ‘a culture problem in football' and that the person investigating was unable to obtain sufficient evidence about the original complaint.

Luck, who was hired in November, reportedly knew some details about the situation before he took the job and was briefed on it when he started--but due to a lack of solid evidence, he waited until the full story came out and gathered more information before formally firing him right before spring practice started. After Taylor's firing, Luck made a statement about his decision.

"It has been clear that certain aspects of the program need change," Luck said. "Additionally, in recent days, there has been significant attention to Stanford investigations in previous years related to Coach Taylor. After continued consideration it is evident to me that our program needs a reset. In consultation with university leadership, I no longer believe that Coach Taylor is the right coach to lead our football program."

Taylor's tenure at Stanford was nothing to write home about. After guiding Sacramento State to an appearance in the FCS playoffs in all three seasons he was in charge there, finishing 30-8 overall, Taylor was hired in December of 2022 to replace longtime Stanford coach, David Shaw.

And while the hope was that he would be able to reverse the program's fortunes, he went 6-18 in two seasons with the Cardinal, guiding the team to a 3-9 record in both 2023 and 2024.

After Taylor was fired, Luck hired his former Indianapolis Colts coach, Frank Reich, to be the interim coach for 2025, where he will look to bring the Cardinal back to national prominence in his lone season at the helm.