Parcells

by Bill Parcells

  The charismatic coach was consumed by his job. Following a 10–7 home loss against Duke on October 7, Parcells sat by himself on his living-room sofa, scowling. Suzy, now four years old, walked in and climbed up next to her dad. But Parcells was beyond even the reach of his cuddly daughter. So Suzy contorted her face, imitating his grimace.

  Mickey Corcoran visited from Jersey to see how Parcells was faring. While watching football practice, Corcoran took pride in the fact that Parcells exuded command and leadership, even through the inflection in his voice. The once-rebellious high school star was a natural teacher. Corcoran smiled as he watched Parcells get down in the dirt to demonstrate for his players. River Dell’s coach left West Point impressed by Parcells and pleased that his recommendation was panning out.

  Army’s student-athletes faced exacting academics and military training, so the maximum daily time allotted to football, except for games, was ninety minutes. Although this constraint posed a challenge for Army’s coaches, it ensured that little time was wasted on the field; Cahill’s staff focused on the most important matters. “It taught me that I probably did better with less time than I did with more,” Parcells says. “It forced you to decide on what exactly was important, and I always remembered that. A lot of coaches say, ‘More [time] is always better.’ I found that not to be true as I matured as a coach.”

  As the Black Knights won six straight, Parcells’s outlook on special teams shifted dramatically. An adherent of Blaik, Cahill stressed special teams more than his counterparts did. Despite a tougher schedule, Army again went 8-2, dropping its finale to Navy. And Parcells saw the significant difference a strong special teams unit could make. Perhaps the quickest way to revitalize a program, he realized, was by strengthening special teams.

  The Black Knights were invited to play in the Sugar Bowl, but the Pentagon reiterated its stance barring Army from any postseason games. The Vietnam War was dividing the nation, which apparently factored in Army’s decision not to embrace the spotlight of a bowl game. The Pentagon said that permitting the Black Knights to play “would tend to emphasize football to an extent not consistent with the mission of the academy, which is to produce officers.”

  After the season, Army hired two new assistants, Al Groh and Ray Handley, who helped the varsity in spring practices and coached the plebes in the fall. Cahill continued to generate accolades for being a stellar leader, but at one point he responded to all the praise by saying, “What is a great coach? A great coach is somebody who has good assistants, and is smart enough to let them coach.”

  In this environment, Parcells learned the importance of a strong supporting cast. He considers his Army stint to be his formative coaching years, describing the decade that followed as the “gypsy years, the blur years.”

  Bill Parcells and has family lived on Bartlett Loop, a row of brick buildings that housed Army’s coaches, their names on green boards outside the front doors. Parcells, Judy, and their two girls shared a duplex home in a two-family housing unit. For Judy, West Point represented the first time she had lived away from home. Except for the harsh winters, the Kansas native enjoyed the military culture and scenic surroundings along the Hudson River.

  Charles and Ida Parcells weren’t far away—only about forty miles, or less than an hour by car. On rare occasions, they attended Army home games. But it was only after the season ended that Judy, her spouse, and the kids visited Oradell for relatively long stretches, giving her a chance to better get to know her parents-in-law. Like virtually everyone who met them, she was intrigued by the sharp contrast in personalities. Judy had never been around any woman like Ida, whom she found to be “volatile” and a bit intimidating. Judy concluded that her husband’s personality came from Ida. “She would give you the shirt off her back if you asked her for it,” Judy says, “but she never let you forget it, either.”

  During the summer, Parcells visited Peekskill Military Academy, where the Jets held training camp. To reach Peekskill, a small town in Westchester County, Parcells and his colleagues took Bear Mountain Bridge over the Hudson River. They made the trip for the opportunity to observe the AFL team coached by Weeb Ewbank and quarterbacked by Joe Namath. Parcells enjoyed scrutinizing one of pro football’s top coaches. Ewbank had led the Baltimore Colts to NFL championships in 1958 and 1959. His first championship came in the so-called greatest game ever played, the overtime thriller against the Giants that so devastated Big Blue fans, including one high school student in Oradell, New Jersey, glued to his car radio.

  In 1963, Bobby Knight, a recent graduate of Ohio State, accepted a job as an assistant coach for Army’s basketball team. Knight’s talents were so prodigious that in two years he was promoted to head coach at the age of twenty-four. When Parcells joined Cahill’s staff, Knight was entering his third season as head basketball coach. Although Parcells lived around the corner from Knight, they first met in West Point’s main gym, where Bill was playing a pickup basketball game that included some of Knight’s assistants. After a break in the action, Knight and Parcells were introduced to each other, and right away realized they were kindred spirits.

  Like Parcells, Knight had starred in high school basketball, baseball, and football before attending college. Knight, who was only one year older than Parcells, accepted a basketball scholarship from Ohio State. One of his professors was Woody Hayes, who taught a popular English class in addition to coaching the Buckeyes football team. Knight was a backup forward on the Ohio basketball team that captured the 1960 NCAA Championship, led by future Hall of Famers John Havlicek and Jerry Lucas. Although basketball became his primary focus, Knight still loved football, just as Parcells remained passionate about basketball even after his decision to coach on the gridiron. Knight wanted to talk football, Parcells hoops. Both coaches remained avid baseball fans, giving them a tie-breaking topic for vigorous discussions.

  They became fast friends. Ambitious, with type A personalities, Knight and Parcells both seemed to take defeat worse than their counterparts. When Army’s basketball team lost a home game, Knight usually visited Parcells at home, remarking half-jokingly that he wanted a place to hide. The two stayed up late, discussing key aspects of the game. Knight saw Parcells’s analytical mind as a valuable asset. The basketball coach was impressed by Parcells’s ability to deconstruct the athleticism of hoopsters as well as gridders, and his painstaking attention to detail.

  The two bright twentysomethings studied their top contemporaries and shared an appreciation for sports history. Parcells was impressed when Knight spoke about the impact on him of three gridiron greats: Red Blaik, Vince Lombardi, and Paul Brown. Knight was born in Massillon, Ohio, where Brown had coached high school football during the 1930s before becoming the most innovative and influential coach in pro football history. “The Thomas Jefferson of football,” says NFL historian and documentarian Steve Sabol. “You can say George Halas is the George Washington: he founded the league. But Paul Brown gave the game a scope and a shape, a language and structure.”

  One afternoon Knight invited Parcells to the Catskill Mountains for dinner with basketball coaching great Clair Bee. The septuagenarian was in retirement after an influential career, highlighted by a historic run at Long Island University in Brooklyn. From 1931 to 1951, Bee’s team had won 83 percent of its games, setting an NCAA Division I record. But his overarching contributions included the 1-3-1 defense and the three-second rule. At dinner with Bee, Parcells noticed a striking shift in Knight’s behavior. Army’s outspoken basketball coach said little and listened raptly. Mostly he asked questions, prompting further insights from Bee. When the evening came to an end after hours of conversation, Knight thanked Bee profusely for his time.

  The friendship between Knight and Parcells grew as they spent time together: Knight’s basement or Parcells’s living room provided the backdrop for conversations that ran deep into the night. They assessed the methods of coaches in all sports and traded ideas about subjects like motivation and strategy. Maniacal ab
out preparation, the two Army coaches agreed that the mental aspect of any game was just as important as the physical. Knight espoused the same philosophy that Corcoran had passed on to Parcells in high school: defense and playing smart maximized the chances for victory. “You’d better guard ’em,” Knight stressed. “And you’d better take good shots.”

  Parcells enjoyed watching Knight conduct practices, noticing that Knight avoided using some traditional basketball drills. Knight explained that he only used drills that he believed truly served a purpose, regardless of what was popular with other coaches. Parcells found Knight’s contrarian outlook smart and bold, especially for a young coach.

  Despite his youth, Knight was already one of the best coaches in Army basketball history. Following his rookie season, when he guided Army to eighteen victories, he was courted by Florida, but decided not to go. Still, Knight only signed one-year contracts, which gave him the most career flexibility. In the spring of 1968, Wisconsin offered Knight a higher-profile head coaching job when John Erickson left to become general manager of the NBA’s Milwaukee Bucks. Upon returning from his visit to Wisconsin, Knight went to Parcells’s house, where the two men discussed the new opportunity into the early morning. By the time Knight headed home, Parcells was convinced that his pal would resign as Army’s head coach.

  Indeed, Knight had all but done so, after asking Wisconsin not to reveal his decision until he informed his superiors. However, when Wisconsin leaked news that Knight would be its new coach, he telephoned the school to officially decline. Parcells was delighted that Knight was signing his fourth one-year contract with Army, knowing it meant he’d be spending more time with his buddy.

  They often played pickup basketball at West Point’s main gym, with its upper-level track encircling the courts below. Because there were so many participants, the contests were typically half-court, make-’em-take-’em, with the winner being the first team to score ten baskets. Among the regulars was Arthur Ashe, who joined West Point in 1966, fulfilling his military service after graduating from UCLA as an ROTC member. Ashe oversaw West Point’s tennis program while competing as one of the world’s top players. Parcells also played hoops with Major Norman Schwarzkopf, an academy instructor in his early thirties.

  In their early games, Parcells and Knight played on opposite sides. Having similar physiques, they ended up defending each other, two aggressive players who knew how to exploit their size in the paint. Their matchup often devolved into heated arguments over disputed foul calls. So, in time, they hatched a plan to consistently play on the same team: One of them would volunteer to be one of the two “captains” who picked players. Knight would make Parcells his first choice—or vice versa.

  During the mid-sixties, America’s involvement in Vietnam was expanding under President Lyndon Baines Johnson, and by 1968 Army’s head coaches faced an increased challenge in guiding their sports programs. Opposition to the war had reached a fever pitch. Students occupied buildings on college campuses, and protesters around the nation were chanting, “Hey, hey, LBJ, how many kids did you kill today?” The acrimonious atmosphere made athletic recruiting more difficult than ever for the Black Knights, and it hadn’t been easy before: along with academic requirements similar to those of the Ivy League schools, West Point required a five-year commitment to the military. Parcells supported Knight by occasionally traveling with him on recruiting trips.

  Meanwhile, Don Parcells faced far graver concerns, deep in the jungles of Vietnam, where he was serving as a captain in the Twenty-Fifth Infantry. One night his brigade came under heavy mortar fire, forcing him into a foxhole, where shrapnel tore one of his legs open. Bleeding profusely, Don knew that he would die soon without a miracle in the form of a rescue helicopter reaching him. It materialized within a few moments, and a medical officer on board applied a tourniquet to Don’s leg as the chopper lifted off to get him further treatment.

  Don recovered from about ten shrapnel wounds, and after returning to the United States he was awarded the Purple Heart for soldiers wounded or killed in battle. Don then served as an instructor at Fort Sill, an army post in Lawton, Oklahoma, where he lived with his wife and infant son. “I’m very lucky,” Parcells says, “that I didn’t lose him in Vietnam.”

  Several officers with ties to the football team aided the coaching staff. Major Joe Bishop, a physics instructor and former Black Knight, worked closely with Parcells. Only six years younger, Parcells enjoyed his time with the major, whom he considered part of the staff. But on July 17, 1968, Bishop left for Vietnam to fulfill a tour as an operations officer. A few months later, Parcells was saddened to hear that Bishop had died on September 19 after his military aircraft crashed in Nha Trang, a coastal city of South Vietnam. When the accident occurred, Bishop’s combat group was returning from a field inspection. Parcells thought about Bishop every day. The tragedy reinforced Parcells’s appreciation for just how lucky his brother had been to survive his combat experience.

  Bill Parcells couldn’t help but be influenced by West Point’s culture and rich history. He relished Army’s structure and gained a deeper appreciation of the military experience. Formally established in 1802 after playing a key role in the Revolutionary War, West Point became the nation’s first and most prestigious service academy. Its alumni, “The Long Gray Line,” included Presidents Ulysses S. Grant and Dwight D. Eisenhower, as well as several renowned generals from Robert E. Lee to George S. Patton. Six years before Parcells arrived, the central campus was designated a national landmark, with its imposing monuments and neo-Gothic architecture, including spired buildings and barracks surrounded by massive stone. During somber funerals for soldiers at West Point, planes roared above the ceremonies. Parcells and Judy enjoyed watching the cadet parades. Their patriotism, already strong, only increased.

  Army’s offensive line coach, Bob Mishak, a West Point graduate who had played for Blaik, recommended a bestselling war novel to Parcells: Once an Eagle by ex-marine Anton Myrer chronicled an Army officer’s rise from cadet to general, overcoming countless obstacles by sticking to his values. Published in 1968, the 1,312-page book became a classic among military personnel. Parcells was particularly taken with a passage about inflexibility, perhaps because it eloquently expounded on his father’s adage “It doesn’t cost you anything to listen.” Parcells memorized it for future use. “Inflexibility—it was the worst human failing; you could learn to check impetuosity, you could overcome fear through confidence and laziness through discipline, but rigidity of mind allowed for no antidote. It carried the seeds of its own destruction.”

  In the late 1960s, football scouting required teams to exchange their game films, and each school assigned a coach to the task. Parcells was Army’s film-exchange coach, and the person holding the job for Navy was a scout named Steve Belichick, who was more than twenty years older than Parcells.

  Belichick was a graduate of Western Reserve, where he had played fullback under Bill Edwards in a single-wing offense that emphasized the position. On graduating in 1941, Belichick used his connection to Edwards, the new Detroit Lions coach, to land a job as the team’s equipment manager. When the Lions struggled early, Belichick made the case that he was just as good, or mediocre, as the Lions’ fullbacks, so Edwards signed the five-foot-eleven, 193-pounder for the rest of a season. Belichick mostly blocked for All-Pro runner Byron White, the future associate justice of the Supreme Court. But one of his professional career highlights was a 65-yard punt return for a touchdown against the Giants. About a decade later, Steve Belichick would name his newborn son, Bill, after his ex-coach, partly in gratitude for being granted the opportunity to live his NFL dream.

  Following that one season, Steve Belichick left football to serve in World War II, after which he coached at Hiram, Vanderbilt, and North Carolina. Steve Belichick joined Navy’s Midshipmen in 1956, when he gave up coaching to specialize as a scout. In 1962, he penned Football Scouting Methods, which became a classic in the profession. That year, Steve’s ten-
year-old son, Bill, started analyzing game film with him. “I’m sure if he had been a fireman,” Bill Belichick says, “I would have been pulling those hoses behind him.” Bill Belichick spent substantial time with his dad at the Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland. During the early 1960s, its star quarterback, Roger Staubach, enlisted the boy to catch his passes. Gradually, Steve’s son assumed various duties for Navy’s program with the blessings of its coaching staff.

  The Army-Navy Game, which dates to 1890, codified one of the most enduring rivalries in college football. Traditionally the annual contest marked the season finale for both service academies. Plenty of scouting went into the game, which occurred at a neutral site, usually Philadelphia because of its equidistance to West Point and Annapolis. Through numerous interactions, Steve Belichick and Bill Parcells came to know and like each other. Both men were diligent and indefatigable in their jobs. Parcells noticed that Belichick showed unusual expertise in special teams, especially the kicking game. Professorial in his spectacles, Steve Belichick often wore a blue baseball cap emblazoned with “N” in gold. His precocious son met Parcells while traveling with Steve on scouting trips.

  On November 30, 1968, at Philadelphia’s John F. Kennedy Stadium, Army defeated Navy 21–14, concluding a 7-3 season.

  During the NFL season, the Green Bay Packers, coached by Charles Parcells’s former neighbor Vince Lombardi, were televised weekly in New York State. So on Sundays, Bill Parcells went over to Knight’s basement to watch their games. During one telecast Lombardi, angered by Green Bay’s shoddy tackling, yelled: “What the hell is going on out here?!” Knight started to use the line on his players long before Lombardi highlights would turn it into a famous phrase.