It's typical overreaction by the Joneses. Jerry was a wildcatter who thought he could throw money around and buy more Super Bowls, neglecting the draft along the way (for years, turning it and pro scouting over to his buddy Larry Lacewell despite Lacewell never having proven that he could do that job). Parcells came in and taught the Joneses about the importance of the draft (essentially that you need real personnel people evaluating it — he replaced Lacewell with Ireland — and can't just pick on a whim) and just when it seemed they were going to use all areas of team building, they allowed some poor free agency choices to convince them that spending big in free agency wasn't worth it.
Note that Lacewell was brought in when Jimmy was coach, but it still was just basically giving a friend a job instead of seeking the most qualified person. Jerry didn't care enough about the draft to do that ... and up until 1994, he essentially had Jimmy to run the draft. Lacewell proved to be one of the worst personnel directors in the game.