Fan's guide | Player stats | Schedule | Roster

Seahawks
In new NFL era, wins elude Tuna

By Greg Bishop
Seattle Times staff reporter

Bill Parcells says football is "an unforgiving game."

E-mail this article Print this article Search archive Most read articles Most e-mailed articles

Related stories Seahawks notebook: Coach says passion not issue NFL notebook: McNair ponders early retirement

KIRKLAND — Bill Parcells started the first of his four head-coaching stints in 1983, back when Mike Holmgren coached quarterbacks at BYU and Matt Hasselbeck retrieved footballs for the teams his father played on.

This was before two Super Bowl championships, before the coach became the legend, before Big Tuna met Big D and everything that went so right one year flipped around and went so wrong the next.

Everything was different then. No salary cap. No free agency. No entourages.

And now this. His 4-7 Dallas Cowboys, a team Parcells called "stupid" earlier this season, are on pace for the fifth losing season of his 17-year coaching career, another reminder that times, they are a-changing.

Parcells sounded wistful ruminating on the changes yesterday, while his Cowboys prepared to face Holmgren, Hasselbeck and the Seahawks on "Monday Night Football."

"The environment around the players is much different," Parcells said. "There are more characters. There are more people involved and more peripheral issues. If the rest of these guys don't have a level head, it's quite easy to get a distorted sense of what you are."

Dallas seemed like every other Parcells reclamation project. Like the 1-15 New York Jets team he transformed into a 9-7 one. Like the hapless New York Giants he started coaching in the 1980s, the hapless New York Giants he later won two Super Bowls with. Like the New England Patriots he guided from last place into AFC champions in 1996.

Parcells is the second coach in the history of football to take two different franchises to the Super Bowl. Dallas will not become his third, not this season at least. Although in the NFC, a 4-7 record still warrants playoff hope and postseason consideration.

But Parcells isn't used to taking his time with the rebuilding. The first time he addressed the Cowboys, Big Tuna made his intentions clear.

"I'm too old to lose," he told them. "I want you guys to get your expectations up now."
 
"It's been tough," linebacker Dexter Coakley said. "Our expectations were up (this season). But not getting victories and not showing the promise that he envisioned, it's tough to see a guy go through that. He's coaching us the way we ought to be coached. We're just not executing.

"He's not used to losing, and when he loses, he takes it really, really hard."

Parcells always pushes for perfection, always demands more from his players than any other coach. Hasselbeck remembers scurrying around the field when his father, Don, played tight end for Parcells.

What stuck with Hasselbeck was the way Parcells rode players in whom he saw potential. If he didn't talk to you, you weren't worth his time. If he yelled and screamed and kicked a Gatorade bucket in your direction, he saw a future.

Holmgren remembers meeting Parcells on the field before the Jets played the Seahawks on Jan. 2, 2000. Parcells told Holmgren he would retire (again) that day. He had a Super Bowl team, but Vinny Testaverde (coincidentally his current quarterback) went down with injury and the season disintegrated into an 8-8 finish.

Holmgren called Parcells one of his idols, one of his mentors, one of the guys he looked up to way back when. He also called him a perfectionist.

"Of all the coaching personalities that I was around growing up, he was the strongest personality and the best coach, the coach with the most success," Hasselbeck said. "Of all the coaches my dad played for, Parcells was his favorite. He's a Hall of Famer."

Parcells doesn't change for anybody. Not his players. Not his front office. Not even the game itself. He started rookie Drew Henson last week against Chicago, then yanked him in favor of an aging and injured Testaverde because he felt the old soldier gave the Cowboys their best chance to win.

His reasoning: "I really don't care. I'm going to do what I think is best."

Which means Parcells isn't giving up on this season, not with the NFC all muddled in the middle. He points to his 1994 season with New England. The Patriots started 3-6, won seven in a row and made the playoffs.

Can his Cowboys, a team Parcells said he still doesn't have "entirely figured out," do the same? "It's an unforgiving game," Parcells said. "I'm trying to keep my own house from burning down."

Greg Bishop: 206-464-3191 or gbishop@seattletimes.com