Davis once talked to Parcells about becoming Raiders coach

Davis once talked to Parcells about becoming Raiders coach
By vtafur@sfchronicle.com (Vittorio Tafur)
San Francisco Chronicle
October 12, 2011

Super-Bowl winning coach Bill Parcells talked about the late Al Davis on ESPN Radio on Tuesday, and here are the highlights:

Whether Parcells ever came close to being the Raiders coach:

“You know, one time he inquired about that. And I said ‘you know Coach, that might be the end of a real nice friendship.’ I said ‘we’d be like Grumpy Old Men, Water Matthau and Jack Lemmon.’ He started laughing, so I said ‘why don’t we pass on that right now.’ And he said ‘okay.’ And we did.”

On the stories of how he and Davis used to sit next to each other in the same spot at each year’s Scouting Combine:

“That’s absolutely correct. Ron Wolf and myself, we would sit right at the start of the 40-yard dash. And we could see visually, we were very close to the players, so you got a good look at their physical make up, the size of their hands, you know, whether they were nervous or not, you got a little idea about their quickness as they burst off the line in the 40-yard sprint. Year after year, that’s exactly right, we would sit there all day long. And coincidentally, we would talk about football players and baseball in New York City and all sorts of things. He was just a great guy and also a very important adviser to me at critical times in my coaching career.”

How Davis’ mantra of personal accountability was something he took with him throughout his Hall of Fame coaching career:

“You know, there was a time early in my career when job security was certainly in question, and I think he was the one who got me really back on track in terms of being able to give me a general manager’s point of view as well as an owner’s point of view. And also he was very adamant about me about just doing your job — ‘Just do the job that they hired you to do, and don’t be distracted by other things around you that you have no control over.’ And you know, it kind of put me back on track — and just in the nick of time by the way — and it was something that I tried to pass forward to all the guys I worked with. Just do your job — players and coaches — and quit worrying about what other people are doing. Just get yours done. And if you’ve got a good team concept, eventually it will come together.”


Read more at:
http://blog.sfgate.com/raiders/2011/10/12/davis-once-talked-to-parcells-about-becoming-raiders-coach/