Bob D’Angelo is a longtime member of the Florida sports media, having served as a reporter and copy editor for more than 30 years. His true sports passion, however, is the history of the various games, exhibited by his in-depth book reviews and hobby of collecting cards and other sports memorabilia. He blogs for TBO.com on both subjects, transferring his work for the Tampa Tribune to the realm of cyberspace.
Parcells presented in a sharper focus
Posted Dec 8, 2011 by Bob D'Angelo
Updated Dec 8, 2011 at 08:46 PM
Bill Parcells had a connection to Tampa long before he coached the Giants to victory in Super Bowl XXV at Tampa Stadium. And long before he had two uneasy flirtations with the Bucs.
His college coach at Wichita State in 1962-63 was Marcelino “Chelo” Huerta, the longtime Hillsborough High School and University of Tampa football coach.
Tampa football fans knew that already. But it is one of the many nuggets of information meticulously presented by Carlo DeVito in “Parcells: A Biography” (Triumph Books, $24.95, hardback, 350 pages). DeVito scanned more than 4,000 original sources (including 2,000 interviews) and presents a deeper picture of the former NFL coach than we are accustomed to.
The Parcells persona is well-known: sarcastic and blunt, a guy who keeps his real thoughts close to the vest. A guy who likes to give the needle. Or, as DeVito quotes Parcells’ mother Ida, “He likes to stir the pot.”
This is an unauthorized biography; when DeVito approached Parcells’ agent about doing book, he was “met with silence.” That is actually liberating, because that allowed DeVito to check sources, read articles, do research and interview people who liked and disliked Parcells. Thanks to the agents’ silence, we get a more rounded picture of the Big Tuna. I should note that DeVito is a New York Giants fan, but will add that such loyalty did not impede his ability to write a balanced biography.
Parcells guided the Giants to a pair of Super Bowl titles, including a 20-19 thriller against the Buffalo Bills at Tampa Stadium in January 1991. Parcells had taken the Giants from the depths of mediocrity in the mid-1980s and had turned them into contenders.
“If football is not the most important thing in your life, he’ll weed you out,” DeVito quotes the Giants’ Jumbo Elliott as saying about Parcells.
Parcells left coaching after that Super Bowl, but rumors began to fly in late 1991 that he might take over as the Bucs coach. As former Bucs beat writer Nick Pugliese told me this week, covering this story caused “many sleepless nights.” As a copy editor on The Tampa Tribune’s sports desk, I recall having to call Nick on Christmas Eve 1991 to tell him about a new angle on the story that needed to be covered. Merry Christmas!
Parcells was all set to take the job, and in fact, Tribune headlines touted that it was a “done deal.” Unfortunately, Parcells changed his mind at 11 p.m. and called Bucs owner Hugh Culverhouse, backing out of the deal. That action led Culverhouse to utter his famous “jilted at the altar” comment, which, in the mundane world of quotes by NFL owners and coaches, was a pretty snappy retort.
Bucs-Parcells is a fascinating story line, but here is where DeVito’s research betrays him a little bit. In relating this episode, he relies on material from the Orlando Sentinel. I am going to be provincial here and say sorry, the best information he could have gleaned would have been from Pugliese’s work at the Tribune and from the efforts of Rick Stroud, the St. Petersburg Times’ Bucs beat writer. Both writers battled hard to get the story, and as Pugliese told me “the Tribune and the Times would go back and forth on it every day” in terms of who had the story of the day.
A minor point in the book, but an interesting one to pounce on here locally.
DeVito also chronicles Parcells’ second flirtation with the Bucs in 2002 and tells a fascinating story.
DeVito labels Parcells as a “Rainmaker,” who takes over a team and then moves on.
After coaching the Giants, Parcells coached the New England Patriots, New York Jets and Dallas Cowboys and was a consultant for the Miami Dolphins. In most cases, he left the franchises in better shape than they were when he arrived.
“Like all rainmakers, he eventually leaves,” DeVito writes.
DeVito tells a good story and gives the reader a sense of Parcells’ youth and the people who influenced him, including his father, Charles “Chubby” Parcells, and his coach as a youth, Mickey Corcoran. He details Parcells’ years as an assistant at Wichita State, Army, Florida State, Vanderbilt, Texas Tech, and his tough season as head coach at Air Force (“It took me only three months to know I had made a mistake,” Parcells said.).
Parcells eventually will be enshrined in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. He was defensive-minded, switching the Giants from a 4-3 to a 3-4 alignment. With assistants like Bill Belichick and Romeo Crennel, Parcells would employ a fast, hard-hitting defense.
On offense, Parcells loved nothing better than a grinding offense. Not pretty to watch, but that kind of offense ate up huge chunks of time and proved to be a decisive factor in Super Bowl XXV (one long drive took 9:29 to complete).
DeVito puts Parcells’ career in perspective and gives the reader a richer, fuller look at one of the NFL’s most dominating personalities — and coach.
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