Parcells

by Bill Parcells

  By training camp Angelo’s prediction proved correct. Typically sparing with compliments, Parcells described Bavaro as his most impressive rookie. During an exhibition game Mowatt suffered a right-knee injury that ended his season, and Bavaro jumped in as a starter for the rest of the year. He turned into not only the league’s best blocker, routinely disabling 300-pound defensive ends, but also one of the most difficult pass-catchers to tackle.

  Mark Bavaro kept the starting job in 1986, performing with toughness, versatility, and self-effacement. The six-four, 245-pounder was so quiet that for several games in October and November, most teammates didn’t notice that his jaw was wired shut; Bavaro had fractured it during a victory versus New Orleans September 28, when he persuaded Parcells to leave him in. The injury would limit the tight end to eating through a straw.

  In the third quarter, facing a substantial deficit against San Francisco, the Giants had the ball at midfield. On second-and-10, Mark Bavaro dashed across the middle for a catch at San Francisco’s 40. Linebacker Mike Walter, attempting a tackle, ping-ponged off Bavaro’s left side, as so many defenders had done throughout the season. Linebacker Riki Ellison dived for another futile attempt. As Bavaro hustled down the field, Ronnie Lott, the star safety known for his fearless hits, wrapped two hands around the tight end’s waist at the 32.

  Big Blue’s man of steel gave Lott a piggyback ride as linebacker Keena Turner hit Bavaro and bounced off. Cornerback Don Griffin tried his luck, but could only slow Bavaro enough for strong safety Carlton Williamson to grab hold. Acting like the Terminator swarmed by overmatched mortals, Bavaro plodded another eight yards before two more 49ers sandwiched him. Finally, Bavaro and four defenders tumbled at the 18-yard line. More than half a ton of San Francisco manpower was needed to halt the indomitable tight end.

  Lawrence Taylor says, “I didn’t respect anyone in the league more than I respected Ronnie Lott. And to see Bavaro dragging Ronnie Lott, it’s like: ‘Yeah!’ ” The Giants wouldn’t be stopped either, scoring 21 points in less than nine minutes to triumph 21–17.

  The hard-fought comeback kept New York in a first-place tie with its next opponent, Joe Gibbs’s Washington Redskins. The Giants traveled to RFK Stadium to face their redoubtable rivals in a rematch after Big Blue’s victory earlier in the season. The critical game lacked suspense as Lawrence Taylor, a native of Williamsburg, Virginia, saved his most dominating performance of the season for his father’s favorite team. With three sacks and an afternoon harrying quarterback Jay Schroeder, Taylor helped his team to a 24–14 win and sole possession of first place in the NFC East. After the game, Parcells predicted that the Giants and Redskins would face each other again in the playoffs.

  Next, Big Blue trounced the St. Louis Cardinals and Green Bay Packers to capture its first division title since the NFL-AFL merger in 1970. The Giants finished 14-2, with nine straight victories, to earn the top seed in the postseason. Showing a tendency to come through in the clutch, Big Blue had won five games by three points or less.

  The Giants allowed an average of only 14.8 points, the league’s best such mark, behind one of the greatest rushing defenses of all time. Highlighting the NFL’s most fearsome group of linebackers, Lawrence Taylor captured every vote for the league MVP award, a rare tribute for a defensive player. With his league-best 20.5 sacks and countless sallies that struck fear in opposing quarterbacks, the linebacker was also named defensive player of the year. On offense Mark Bavaro finished with 1,001 receiving yards, only the eighth tight end in league history to eclipse the thousand-yard milestone. And in turning a once-sputtering franchise into an NFL juggernaut, Parcells garnered Coach of the Year. Still he yearned for more, and the next step was a postseason home game versus San Francisco.

  Bill Parcells was fanatical about game-day weather, particularly during playoffs. Before home contests he telephoned Newark Airport or the National Weather Service to gather precise intelligence about such factors as the wind. “If I had had their home numbers,” Parcells says, “I would have called meteorologists.” But when his team arrived at Giants Stadium to face the 49ers, a much more pressing issue surfaced: the absence of wideout Bobby Johnson.

  For home games players checked out of a nearby hotel, and generally took their own vehicles to the stadium. The game-day deadline for arrival was ninety minutes before the opening kickoff, but most players arrived a couple of hours in advance. By the time the Giants finished warming up, with less than an hour to go, Johnson was still AWOL. Leading Big Blue’s wideouts in receptions, the five-eleven, 170-pounder was a critical aspect of the team’s offensive game plan. In his absence the Giants were left with only three wideouts including Phil McConkey, whose primary job was returning punts. Lionel Manuel had participated in only a few practices after spending a month on the injured reserve with a broken ankle.

  Following the 1983 season, Bobby Johnson had been among the players Parcells monitored for drug use. The undrafted receiver via Kansas fell in line while contributing to the team for three seasons. Now, however, as the Giants returned to the locker room before the opening kickoff versus San Francisco, Johnson still couldn’t be found. His teammates were furious at the thought that Johnson had chosen a pivotal playoff game to backslide.

  A few minutes before New York had to step on the field for the national anthem, Johnson entered the locker room. Before he could try to explain his lateness, Jim Burt, Harry Carson, and Lawrence Taylor shoved the receiver to the ground, cursing and hitting him. As George Martin and Lionel Manuel tried to calm things down, Johnson managed to get back on his feet, but his teammates weren’t quite finished punishing him.

  Nose tackle Jerome Sally shouted, “Bill! Bill! Get out here!”

  Defensive end Eric Dorsey added, “They’re killing him! They’re killing him! They’re killing him!”

  Parcells rushed out of his office to the odd sight of Jim Burt ripping Johnson’s dress shirt before pushing him into his locker stall. “You better play. If you don’t play your ass off, we’ll beat you again after the game.”

  Still struggling to make sense of the bizarre scene, Parcells shouted, “Wait, wait. Whoa, whoa, whoa.” The head coach defused the situation, but tensions remained high as the Giants headed to the field. George Martin recalls the fallout from Johnson’s last-minute appearance. “Pouncing on him wasn’t the answer. Giving him a pass wasn’t the answer either. My position was that cooler heads should prevail. Let’s put it aside for the moment, and let’s go and play. And that’s what we did.”

  Setting aside the brouhaha, the Giants claimed a 14–3 lead in the second quarter. With the outcome far from determined against a potent 49ers offense, Phil Simms faced third-and-15 in San Francisco’s red zone. Bobby Johnson’s pattern required him to go in motion from the left side and run to the right corner of the end zone. As Simms released the ball, defensive end Dwaine Board and safety Jeff Fuller rammed into him, slamming Simms’s head hard against the artificial surface. Lawrence Taylor sprinted over from the sideline, the first Giant to check on his teammate, but Simms declined any assistance, rising gingerly to head for the bench. Nose tackle Jim Burt informed him that Johnson had caught the tight spiral for a touchdown, increasing New York’s lead to 21–3, but Simms didn’t celebrate the news until trainer Ronnie Barnes administered smelling salts.

  On San Francisco’s next possession, first-and-20 at New York’s 18, Jim Burt bulled his way up the middle to wallop Joe Montana just as the quarterback released a long throw to his left. The ball wobbled well short of its target, Jerry Rice, leading to an interception by Lawrence Taylor. With Rice several yards behind, Taylor sprinted 34 yards for a touchdown. Montana suffered a concussion severe enough to warrant an ambulance to the hospital, becoming the fourth quarterback the Giants had forced out of a game that season.

  Jeff Kemp, son of the American politician and ex–AFL star quarterback, replaced Montana, but the offense made no better headway against the wrecking ball of New York’s defense. The final score
was 49–3, a brilliant performance that saved Bobby Johnson from further locker-room reprisals.

  In his postgame remarks, San Francisco coach Bill Walsh told reporters, “We were shattered by a great team,” and described Big Blue’s performance as being “perfect.”

  • • •

  Reviewing Big Blue’s masterpiece, though, Parcells saw chips in the Mona Lisa. At the team’s next round of meetings he ran through a litany of flaws and declared the final score misleading. Although San Francisco had recorded only one sack, Parcells spent much of practice harping on how the 49ers repeatedly hit Simms. Parcells stressed that Big Blue had no chance of advancing to the Super Bowl without better pass protection.

  The criticism left players feeling as if they were coming off a slipshod loss instead of a tour de force that sent them to the NFC Championship. “It almost immediately took the joy out of winning,” Simms says. For the rest of the week Parcells’s perfectionism, carping, and doomsday scenarios kept players on edge.

  This behavior wasn’t unusual for the Giants head coach, a firm believer that football success stemmed more from understanding human beings than X’s and O’s. Parcells wanted to counter what he termed “the psychology of results.” He broke this down into four situations.

  1. Trouncing an opponent like San Francisco caused overconfidence, which meant he needed to keep his team grounded and focused. “Everybody else is pumping air in them,” he says. “Everybody else is telling them how great they are.”

  2. Losing a close game despite a sharp, spirited effort prompted the team to feel snakebitten. Parcells insisted that regardless of the setback, maintaining intense effort would lead to a winning stretch.

  3. A resounding defeat created doubt, so Parcells worked toward the next game while instilling confidence and underscoring a chance at redemption.

  4. The worst scenario was a victory after subpar play. Here, Parcells repeatedly reminded his team that its luck would run out without drastic improvements.

  “The psychology of results is a powerful deterrent to team success,” Parcells says. “It affects everybody: owners, the GMs, the fans, the press. Everybody. The same thing is true for individual performances. Some players are satisfied with performing well, despite their team losing. I don’t want those players on my team. The best players I’ve had, when they played well and we lost, they were miserable. If they played poorly and we won, they were happy we won.”

  Parcells reined in whoever he deemed was getting inflated by accolades—“the fat-cat syndrome”—by pulling the culprit aside and detailing mistakes overlooked by the media. The coach concluded the jarring conversation by conveying disappointment that the player didn’t share his high standards. Conversely, Parcells had an uncanny knack for lifting dispirited athletes like Simms before his virtuoso performance versus Minnesota. Leading up to the NFC Championship, though, Parcells’s growling overshadowed any praise for his powerful team.

  Parcells’s prediction about facing Washington in the postseason came true after Joe Gibbs’s team stunned the Chicago Bears, 27–13, at Soldier Field. The Bears had matched the Giants for the league’s best record while positioning themselves to repeat as Super Bowl champions. But the Redskins, who finished second in the NFC East at 12-4, proved to be dangerous. The upset victory meant that they would meet their New York nemesis in East Rutherford to determine the NFC Championship.

  Ahead of the January 11, 1987, affair, Parcells obtained his detailed weather prognostication. The temperature would be 39 degrees, lowered by wind chill to 29; of more concern to Parcells was a wind forecast at 22 miles per hour. So despite a 4 p.m. kickoff, Parcells, wearing his blue windbreaker and black gloves for the game, arrived on the field at 7:15 a.m. to take in the elements. Over the next few hours he returned to the gridiron three more times to confirm the cold, blustery conditions.

  When players showed up for warm-ups about ninety minutes before the game, with Bobby Johnson arriving conspicuously early, the swirling wind easily exceeded the forecast. Redskins punter Steve Cox, known for his ability to handle the elements, struggled to prevent balls from fluttering back toward him. Giants Stadium was notorious for its winter wind, but this was the strongest that punter Sean Landeta, or even Bill Parcells, had ever witnessed in East Rutherford.

  About thirty minutes before kickoff, Parcells had his usual meeting with his punter and kicker to discuss the weather. Landeta predicted, “The wind will be a bigger factor than L.T.” As the visiting team the Redskins got to select heads or tails on the coin flip, with the winner earning the option to receive the kickoff or defend either goal. Ordinarily teams choose to take the kickoff and start the game on offense, but this time, Parcells gave his co-captain Harry Carson different instructions.

  “If we win the coin toss, take the wind and let the Redskins receive.”

  The Redskins sent five players, led by offensive tackle Russ Grimm, to midfield. As referee Pat Haggerty tossed an oversized nickel in the windswept stadium, the five Redskins yelled “Heads.” Tails showed up on the Astroturf, so Carson informed Haggerty that Big Blue would defend the east goal. The decision allowed the Giants, aiming for a fast start, to play the first period with the wind at their backs.

  The Redskins didn’t go far on their first drive versus a revved-up defense, further aroused by 76,490 enthusiastic spectators. On fourth down, Steve Cox’s punt into a gale wobbled to midfield, about a dozen yards short of an awaiting Phil McConkey, before bouncing out of bounds at Washington’s 47. The ball had traveled only 23 yards. After several plays, the Giants had moved the ball within field-goal range. Raul Allegre converted a wind-abetted 47-yarder, his longest field goal as a Giant, to open the scoring.

  The Redskins struggled on their next possession, causing Cox to punt again, this time from the end zone. As McConkey stood near midfield, the ball fluttered well short of him: the 27-yard punt was barely longer than Cox’s first try. Joe Morris’s running sparked a drive that had started at Washington’s 38, and culminated when Phil Simms stepped up into the pocket, throwing an 11-yard dart to Lionel Manuel in the middle of the end zone. After only two possessions the Giants led 10–0.

  In contrast to Cox’s punts, Landeta’s only attempt in the first quarter traveled 40 yards, and his kicks into the wind were also relatively strong. With Washington struggling to move against gusts of more than 30 miles per hour, New York’s lead seemed substantial even before Joe Morris’s one-yard scamper into the end zone for a second-quarter touchdown. “The coin toss was probably the biggest play of the game,” Gibbs recalls. “And I’m not being sarcastic.”

  Quarterbacks on both teams maintained little control of any pass that flew more than a dozen yards. In Schroeder’s case, the degree of difficulty increased because he was constantly flushed out of the pocket. The alternative, running against the Big Blue Wrecking Crew, was futile, and 76,000-plus howling fans, a record crowd at Giants Stadium, hindered Washington’s offense almost as much as the elements. The Redskins were repeatedly forced to punt, and when Cox’s kicks did reach McConkey he cleanly corralled the pigskin despite its herky-jerky movements. Parcells’s over-the-top drills were paying off. Conversely, Washington’s punt returner Eric Yarber too often allowed Landeta’s balls to drop, limiting his team’s field position.

  After another futile Redskins possession with less than four minutes left, thousands of fans started shredding newspapers, programs, and paper cups to fling loose pieces into the wind; spectators also unleashed rolls of toilet paper, creating the atmosphere of a ticker-tape parade.

  The Redskins had the ball at New York’s 22 on a fourth-and-2 when another Jay Schroeder pass floated away from an open receiver on a short route. With about two minutes remaining, the crowd turned its roar of approval up a notch. Despite potent weapons like wideout Art Monk and tailback George Rogers, Gibbs’s team would be shut out for the first time in his tenure.

  As Simms killed the clock, Harry Carson went behind Big Blue’s bench to grab one of the t
hree Gatorade buckets. Slipping past complicit teammates, Carson snuck up behind Parcells, who swung around just in time to see him looming. Parcells backpedaled, sidestepped, and with a flash of his former athleticism, charged Carson and tried to wrest away the Gatorade. The tables, or bucket, seemed to be turning until punter Sean Landeta grabbed Parcells from behind. To the delight of teammates and spectators, Carson drenched the Giants head coach, who smiled before glancing sternly at the clock.

  The ritual would turn into an American sports tradition, the Gatorade shower, for the winning coach moments after a victory. It had apparently started October 20, 1985—when Big Blue defeated Washington 17–3, Jim Burt dumped the liquid on Parcells—but the act became popularized the next season as the Tuna got drenched again and again.

  The final tick of the clock in the NFC Championship gave the Giants their first conference title since 1963. Knowing their team was Super Bowl bound for the first time, spectators didn’t want to leave the stadium. One mustachioed, middle-aged man pulled out a champagne bottle and poured it into beer cups for everyone sitting in his row. Jim Burt climbed into the stands to embrace his wife and son before ending up exchanging high-fives and hugs with ecstatic fans.

  As Bill Belichick, wearing a gray hoodie under his red Giants jacket, walked across the field, he was hoisted off the ground by two of his players. Grinning, the coordinator placed one black-gloved hand atop each player’s helmet, and decided to enjoy the ride on their shoulders. The scene would be captured on the front page of the January 12 New York Times with a caption that read, “Bill Belichick, the Giants defensive coordinator, being carried off the field after 17–0 victory over the Redskins.” Belichick would collect one hundred copies for posterity.