It sounds to me like he'd really like to do it, but the body isn't up for it any more.
If only Parcells had come sooner
By Randy Galloway
Star-Telegram Staff Writer
Michael Irvin had to see for himself. Showing up at Valley Ranch on Thursday night, he waited for Bill Parcells to exit the introductory media conference, then immediately put a Playmaker bear hug on the Cowboys' new coach.
"Thank you ... thank you," Irvin told Parcells. Michael was obviously rather pleased about Bill taking the job.
Meanwhile, at the Aikman hacienda, located well north of Valley Ranch, Troy was admittedly a bit angry. He moped around the house, and, with wife Rhonda as his only audience, told her: "Seven years I waited on something like this. The last seven years of my career, wasted."
Mark down Aikman as another old glory-days Cowboy giving full approval to the arrival of Parcells. Obviously, however, Troy was wishing it had been a lot sooner.
Foreign NFL outposts were also heard from immediately.
The 5-11 Cowboys ended the season with a whimper and a surrender. It was a team and is an organization reduced to punk status in the NFL. Does any rival really care enough anymore to take the Cowboys seriously?
Well, according to sports page columns that popped up in The Washington Post, The Philadelphia Inquirer and the New York Daily News, the message was the same for NFC East rivals of the Cowboys:
You'd better watch out, Eagles, Giants and Redskins. Bill is back, and the revival of the Cowboys won't be far behind.
Where Parcells goes, expectations follow. But when Parcells comes to the Cowboys, expectations quickly soar far beyond reality. Yes, it is always that way, no matter the coach. Such is life with the Cowboys. But Parcells, with his persona, simply takes these expectations to new extremes.
On that note, however, let it be said that Jerry Jones has made the best hire in franchise history, which is not an observation intended to invoke a debate over the merits of Tom Landry or Jimmy Johnson.
Instead, let's talk about where the franchise is right now. A case can be made that the lowest point in 42 years of existence has been reached. It was the most hopeless December the Cowboys have ever had, at least based on my memory.
Blame Jones, of course. Jerry is the easy target, the logical target, and the correct target.
But once Jerry hit bottom, he also knew where he was.
A drastic move was necessary. For Jerry, of course, nothing is more drastic than the hiring of Parcells, based on everything Jones has stubbornly stood for over the past nine years, or since The Jimster walked.
Call it what you want -- a change of philosophy, culture, direction, etc. -- but with this 180-degree spin, Jerry just won the X-Games gold medal in snowboarding. And without a snow job being involved.
Go back to Aikman and his reaction to the hiring of Parcells. There's a reason Troy sounded jealous. He is.
"I can't tell you how many times when I was playing, particularly later in my career, that I thought about how I'd like to be on Parcells' team for at least a season," Aikman said. "I was intrigued about finding out what this guy has that always seems to bring out the best in his teams."
Is there something secret involved?
"I don't think so," Aikman said. "I think it's one obvious thing. Discipline."
And this is still a lingering sore subject with Aikman from his post-Jimmy years with the Cowboys.
"We had it, had the great discipline, and then we lost it," Troy said. "In all my conversations with Jerry, and all those times he would ask me what I thought we needed, the first thing I always told him was we need a coach who will bring back the discipline."
And now, here comes Parcells, although it's too late for Aikman.
"I applaud Jerry for doing this, but, yeah, I'm also mad at him," said Aikman, laughing. "I mean, those seven years after Jimmy left, and this is exactly what I wanted, and now Jerry finally does it."
Why did he do it? Why Parcells? Even in desperate times for Jones, no one was thinking this.
"We sat down and put together kind of a what-if list, as in what if we made a coaching change," said Stephen Jones, the team's vice president. "The thinking was that any change would have to be a drastic one. So our list had a lot of drastic names on it. Some were so far out there, you couldn't imagine us hiring them."
And Parcells?
"His name was on the drastic list," Stephen said.
Strangely, however, Parcells was also thinking on the same wavelength. Actually, Bill made the first move in testing Jerry's interest, going as far as having ESPN colleague Chris Mortensen pass along Parcells' phone number to Jones.
"Even without that, Bill would have still been in the picture," Stephen said. "But Bill's interest certainly got our attention."
Then came Bill's hire. And now that's got everyone's attention.
But there is still some local fretting about Parcells not having a long-term commitment. That he will be gone in three or four years. Also, the question comes up about Jerry making a mistake in not attempting to hire a young assistant coach from the NFL, or a college coach such as Oklahoma's Bob Stoops.
But this was not the time in franchise history for any of those. This was about now. This was a time to restore the basic foundation of what winning football games is all about. Discipline, for one. And the return to a head coach who brings power and authority to the job.
That is what Bill Parcells is all about. And that's what the Cowboys once again need to be all about. |
