t's Time, Maybe, for an Aging Mercenary to Come Home
Posted: Tue Jan 04, 2005 3:31 am
t's Time, Maybe, for an Aging Mercenary to Come Home
By HARVEY ARATON
East Rutherford, N.J.
A GIANTS game against a team coached by Bill Parcells typically reminds me of a family gathering that awkwardly brings together long-divorced parents. On one side of the field is Parcells, with his latest professed love, currently the Cowboys. On the other side last night were the Giants, with their newest rebound coach, about whom people say, "He's no Parcells."
Everyone has moved on. Nobody looks happy.
Oh, I know that wherever Parcells has gone since walking out on the Giants, he has created romantic championship visions.
He took the Patriots to the Super Bowl in the 1996 season, losing to the Packers. He reinvented the Jets in less time than it takes to start up the engines. He led the woebegone Cowboys to the playoffs last season.
But my guess is that no relationship has been as gratifying for Parcells, the quintessential North Jersey guy, as the one he found next door, with the Giants in the Meadowlands. Together, they birthed two Super Bowl victories and created a Giants Stadium legacy that is still spooking those who follow.
In a surprisingly spirited game at Parcells's old haunt in which the Little Giants rallied in the final minute to beat the Lost 'Boys, 28-24, was it so far-fetched to ponder reconciliation before it's too late?
Couldn't Parcells have given one Mara or another a conciliatory hug and whispered, "Call me?"
Lord knows Parcells and the Giants could use some excitement, some ambitious play calling by Cupid, after taking turns making each other miserable these last two years.
Remember how Parcells brought his Cowboys here early last season and, with the help of a botched Giants kickoff, stole a victory on a misty Monday night?
Jim Fassel had been a perfectly likable and reasonably successful partner for the Giants in their efforts to bust the Parcells ghost once and for all. But by morning, the marriage was well on its way to being over. Fassel wasn't organized enough, or tough enough, or smart enough. He wasn't Bill Parcells.
So the Giants dumped Mr. Nice and resumed looking for Mr. Right. They consulted the coaching personals, and the classified that most intrigued them, of course, read: "Devout Parcelluite, kicks butt like Bill."
Unfortunately for Tom Coughlin, a former Parcells assistant with the Giants, he didn't bring Parcells's credentials or charisma to get away with being the stone-faced bully, and he may never pull it off with this team, in this market.
With the personality of a cactus, Coughlin has not only put off the news media, but he has also lost the attention of some players along the way to another disastrous season that, in retrospect, peaked in Week 5. That's when the Giants went down to Irving, Tex., shocked the Cowboys, 26-10, and left Parcells sounding as if the bloom were off the rose.
He called his team stupid and added, after a couple of trademark risks that backfired, "I learned a long time ago that if you have a team that needs momentum creation to play well, then you probably don't have a very good team."
The Cowboys proceeded to make a prophet of their coach, with a leaky defense and a creaky offense led by Vinny the Ancient, a Parcells import. Who will be Dallas's quarterback next season? Parcells can't say. Not Vinny Testaverde, who last night might have played his last pro game. Maybe Drew Henson.
Bad as it has been for the Giants (eight straight defeats until last night), at least Eli Manning improved these last three weeks, culminating with three touchdown passes and encouraging end-game poise as he earned his first pro victory. His pedigree foretells eventual success, if General Manager Ernie Accorsi gets around to the construction of a sturdy offensive line.
As for Parcells, his wanderlust is beginning to wear on him, making him look less like a mercenary and more like a journeyman.
Bill Belichick, another of his disciples, has replaced him as the premier coach in the N.F.L.
Imagine what it is like for Parcells, having to look every morning at Jerry Jones, the Mark Cuban of football owners before there was a Mark Cuban. Might it be enough to make a man mourn for a home-cooked meal, or even a rest stop snack along the New Jersey Turnpike?
Yes, we are dabbling with fiction bordering on fantasy here, but let me make one New Year's prediction: If the Giants continue to struggle next season, if premier free agents won't enlist at Camp Coughlin, there will at some point be one last drumbeat for Parcells to return.
Divorced couples often reconcile, do they not?
Pamela Anderson and Tommy Lee have already reunited twice. In football, there are financial considerations, contracts to pay off, but stranger things have happened.
And what's so strange about Parcells in the not-too-distant future coming to the conclusion that he has had enough of Dallas, enough of the road, and that he won't feel a sense of career completion until he returns to his roots and closes his coaching circle?
He will turn 64 next summer, isn't getting any younger, and only Manning, not the Giants, has gotten any better.