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Parcells Era Begins In Miami; Injury Update
December 27, 2007
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By Andy Kent
Special for MiamiDolphins.com
Bill Parcells couldn't have made his first day on the job with the Dolphins a quiet one if he wanted to, not with the enormity of his persona and his reputation around the National Football League. So he drove past the slew of television trucks parked across the street from the team's practice facility in Davie, took a look at his new office where he will preside as Miami's Executive Vice President of Football Operations, and sauntered onto the practice field to watch Head Coach Cam Cameron and his staff put their players through drills in preparation for Sunday's season finale against the Cincinnati Bengals.
Parcells, 66, has been through this ritual four times before with the New York Giants, New England Patriots, New York Jets and Dallas Cowboys, but in each of those instances he was taking over as head coach. This time around he has said he has no interest in wearing the headsets again or acting as general manager, but he no doubt will put his stamp on this latest rebuilding project of his.
"My job I think can be pretty much simply described as I'm charged with trying to put a structure in place that will allow the Dolphins to begin to restore the competitive team to the American Football Conference," Parcells in his first press conference as a member of the Dolphins. "I'm charged with putting a structure in place to include General Manager, Head Coach and various other positions within the organization that will again start the Dolphins back toward being competitive on a yearly basis.
"I have no ambition to coach and I have no ambition to be a general manager. I'm hopeful that I can oversee that structure and allow them to do things, those people in those positions, to do things that are common to those positions, so I'm not going to be involved in the coaching and I'm not going to be involved in the general managing. But I'm going to try to help those people the best I can, more as an owner's designee."
In terms of his familiarity with Cameron and current General Manager Randy Mueller, Parcells said he met Cameron for the first time last year ad acknowledged that they do have a couple of mutual friends. He dealt with Mueller in the past when Mueller was the GM in Seattle and New Orleans and he is planning to sit down with both next week after Cameron wraps up his season-ending responsibilities.
Parcells' presence could be felt around the facility all day long, and the players definitely sensed something different during their final Thursday practice of the season. They were aware that Parcells was going to be around today and tried to control their sense of anticipation.
"I think the air on the practice field got a little thin out there," said 10 th-year veteran defensive tackle Vonnie Holliday, who has 38 tackles (30 solo), two sacks and a forced fumble despite missing a handful games with an ankle injury. "Parcells came out of course and watched practice, and when he walked out of course everybody noticed, and there was a little whisper here and there. I'm sure people didn't know what to expect, myself included, but he just came out and observed practice, didn't say much, just kind of sat back in the shadows, talked to a few of the coaches, and that was it, nothing major. He didn't address the team, nothing like that.
"From the time he walked out everybody knows he's there and he has people's attention. He deserves that. That's what he's gained over his years after all his accomplishments. Like I said, we all are excited about it. Guys hope to be a part of it. We know we have our work cut out for us and we're auditioning and hopefully I'll be one of the guys that gets one of those leading roles."
What Parcells did do was address the media long after the players and coaches had gone home, laying out his blueprint for how he plans to go about bringing the franchise back to its glory days and infusing a winning attitude and a winning aura into the team and the organization again. He stressed character as a key ingredient in the types of players he wants on the roster and identified a three-tier system he has used to evaluate players – general background and the personal make-up of the player, critical factors as defined by him and his staff for each position and positional skills.
Parcells' track record speaks for himself, having brought two Super Bowl titles to the Giants, and then taking a moribund Patriots team to its second Super Bowl in 1996, which wound up being a loss to the Green Bay Packers. He left New England to lead a Jets team that was 1-15 the year before his arrival and had them in the AFC Championship Game two years later, and then at his last stop in Dallas, he went 10-6 in his first year after the Cowboys had gone 5-11 the three years prior.
As the purveyor of all of Miami's football fortunes, Parcells is going to lean on those past experiences with different franchises, and while he confirmed that in his job as an analyst for ESPN he was paying attention to the entire league and had familiarized himself with Miami's situation, he wants to take his time and meet with everybody involved in the football operations to get a better sense of the team's needs. One of the people he intends to reacquaint himself with is the Dolphins' Director of College Scouting, Chris Grier, who was an intern under Parcells in New England back in 1994.
"Chris has kind of an idea what's coming here," Parcells said. "He has been around me for a while. His dad and I know each other well, and so I want to put a system, or help put a system in place that cuts down our margin of error in the draft. We will try to spend an awful lot of time investigating these players personally. Our draft board will now have a lot of names of players on it; there'll be a much reduced number. We're going to try to make our scouts decisive and committed to people rather than just being able to pile guys into a category. We won't have that. I just want to get it in place so that I'm confident that that's going to be the process, and the implementation of that, that'll be someone else."
The energy level at practice definitely was higher than a typical Thursday, but then again, there has been nothing typical about this season. Linebacker Joey Porter, who signed with the Dolphins as a free agent after eight years with the Pittsburgh Steelers, noticed a change in not only the players but also the coaches.
"Yeah, guys were nervous out there. They got to run around a little faster and everything, coaches got to coach a little louder, so you definitely knew he was out there. It wasn't like a normal Thursday practice. I know it was our last Thursday practice of the year, but when the cameras were up in the stands, and I saw the vans outside when I came in this morning, everybody's been waiting for Thursday. We got the memo a long time ago that he was coming in on Thursday so we were waiting just like you guys were waiting."
Having played for Bill Cowher in Pittsburgh, Porter knows a thing or two about coaches in the mold of Parcells, and he definitely is impressed with Parcells' credentials and what he can do for the Dolphins.
"He's good at what he does. He's a football guy. He's a good evaluator. He know football, he knows talent, and whatever it is he can do to come in here to Miami and get this team turned around, I'm all for it. I just want to win, and he's coming from winning programs. He's known for building programs to win and we'll just all wait and see. This year's over. We've got one game to finish out and then we'll wait for him to do his magic."
Holliday concurs.
"This does bring new promise, new hope if you will to the organization. There are a lot of expectations," he said. "He's a guy who fixes problems and we have a big problem here and hopefully he's going to come in and I'll be a part of that and we'll get it fixed."
Football has been magic to Parcells his entire life, which explains why he keeps coming back into the league after swearing he was done on a number of different occasions. Sitting in front of the cameras and the reporters this evening, Parcells allowed himself to bare a but of his soul and didn't waver when asked why he took this job with the Dolphins.
"I quit being ashamed of what I am. I think I'm a guy that likes football very much. I've always liked it," he said. "I guess you call that maybe a male menopause, when you realize and you're no longer ashamed of what you are, and I think that happened to me many years ago really. I just can't get the game out of my system, really. I do love the game very much and I certainly have a lot of respect for the people that came before me that made this league what it is, and I honestly mean that."
He was also asked whether he not feels pressure to succeed
"Yeah, I do feel pressure. I don't mind saying that," Parcells said. "Anytime you're involved in anything I feel the same kind of pressure as Wayne feels and the coaches feel and the personnel people. When you're name's on it and it's not going too well it doesn't make any difference how many championships you've won or how many Super Bowls or how many division titles; you're not winning now. I do feel pressure to try to improve this situation and certainly I come here with an understanding that that's what I'm supposed to try to do. And I will tell the fans of the Dolphins that starting tomorrow morning that's what I'm going to be working on, and I will work on it as diligently as I possibly can. And I mean that."
He has proven to be a man of his word in the past and despite his age he feels energized and committed to the challenge that lies ahead.
INJURY UPDATE: Safety Travis Daniels (ankle), defensive end Jason Taylor (ankle) and nose tackle Keith Traylor (ankle) did not practice for the second day in a row ... For the Bengals, halfback DeDe Dorsey (ankle), center Eric Ghiaciuk (foot) and safety Madieu Williams (thigh) have been ruled out of Sunday's game ... Safety Dexter Jackson (calf), halfback Rudi Johnson (hamstring), wide receiver Glenn Holt (back) and cornerback Deltha O'Neal (coach's decision) did not practice ... Right tackle Willie Anderson (hamstring) was limited ... T.J. Houshmmanzadeh (ankle) and linebacker Dhani Jones (shoulder) participated in a full practice.
TAMING THE TIGER: Locker room interviews and a more thorough look ahead to Sunday's season finale against the Cincinnati Bengals with Geoff Hobson of Bengals.com will be among the featured items Friday on Miami Dolphins.com All-Access. The Internet radio show, co-hosted by Barry Buetel and Andy Kent, airs from 2-3 p.m., on MiamiDolphins.com and it also can be downloaded as a podcast.
http://www.miamidolphins.com/newsite/news/top_story.asp?contentID=5610
December 27, 2007
Print This Page Send to Friend
By Andy Kent
Special for MiamiDolphins.com
Bill Parcells couldn't have made his first day on the job with the Dolphins a quiet one if he wanted to, not with the enormity of his persona and his reputation around the National Football League. So he drove past the slew of television trucks parked across the street from the team's practice facility in Davie, took a look at his new office where he will preside as Miami's Executive Vice President of Football Operations, and sauntered onto the practice field to watch Head Coach Cam Cameron and his staff put their players through drills in preparation for Sunday's season finale against the Cincinnati Bengals.
Parcells, 66, has been through this ritual four times before with the New York Giants, New England Patriots, New York Jets and Dallas Cowboys, but in each of those instances he was taking over as head coach. This time around he has said he has no interest in wearing the headsets again or acting as general manager, but he no doubt will put his stamp on this latest rebuilding project of his.
"My job I think can be pretty much simply described as I'm charged with trying to put a structure in place that will allow the Dolphins to begin to restore the competitive team to the American Football Conference," Parcells in his first press conference as a member of the Dolphins. "I'm charged with putting a structure in place to include General Manager, Head Coach and various other positions within the organization that will again start the Dolphins back toward being competitive on a yearly basis.
"I have no ambition to coach and I have no ambition to be a general manager. I'm hopeful that I can oversee that structure and allow them to do things, those people in those positions, to do things that are common to those positions, so I'm not going to be involved in the coaching and I'm not going to be involved in the general managing. But I'm going to try to help those people the best I can, more as an owner's designee."
In terms of his familiarity with Cameron and current General Manager Randy Mueller, Parcells said he met Cameron for the first time last year ad acknowledged that they do have a couple of mutual friends. He dealt with Mueller in the past when Mueller was the GM in Seattle and New Orleans and he is planning to sit down with both next week after Cameron wraps up his season-ending responsibilities.
Parcells' presence could be felt around the facility all day long, and the players definitely sensed something different during their final Thursday practice of the season. They were aware that Parcells was going to be around today and tried to control their sense of anticipation.
"I think the air on the practice field got a little thin out there," said 10 th-year veteran defensive tackle Vonnie Holliday, who has 38 tackles (30 solo), two sacks and a forced fumble despite missing a handful games with an ankle injury. "Parcells came out of course and watched practice, and when he walked out of course everybody noticed, and there was a little whisper here and there. I'm sure people didn't know what to expect, myself included, but he just came out and observed practice, didn't say much, just kind of sat back in the shadows, talked to a few of the coaches, and that was it, nothing major. He didn't address the team, nothing like that.
"From the time he walked out everybody knows he's there and he has people's attention. He deserves that. That's what he's gained over his years after all his accomplishments. Like I said, we all are excited about it. Guys hope to be a part of it. We know we have our work cut out for us and we're auditioning and hopefully I'll be one of the guys that gets one of those leading roles."
What Parcells did do was address the media long after the players and coaches had gone home, laying out his blueprint for how he plans to go about bringing the franchise back to its glory days and infusing a winning attitude and a winning aura into the team and the organization again. He stressed character as a key ingredient in the types of players he wants on the roster and identified a three-tier system he has used to evaluate players – general background and the personal make-up of the player, critical factors as defined by him and his staff for each position and positional skills.
Parcells' track record speaks for himself, having brought two Super Bowl titles to the Giants, and then taking a moribund Patriots team to its second Super Bowl in 1996, which wound up being a loss to the Green Bay Packers. He left New England to lead a Jets team that was 1-15 the year before his arrival and had them in the AFC Championship Game two years later, and then at his last stop in Dallas, he went 10-6 in his first year after the Cowboys had gone 5-11 the three years prior.
As the purveyor of all of Miami's football fortunes, Parcells is going to lean on those past experiences with different franchises, and while he confirmed that in his job as an analyst for ESPN he was paying attention to the entire league and had familiarized himself with Miami's situation, he wants to take his time and meet with everybody involved in the football operations to get a better sense of the team's needs. One of the people he intends to reacquaint himself with is the Dolphins' Director of College Scouting, Chris Grier, who was an intern under Parcells in New England back in 1994.
"Chris has kind of an idea what's coming here," Parcells said. "He has been around me for a while. His dad and I know each other well, and so I want to put a system, or help put a system in place that cuts down our margin of error in the draft. We will try to spend an awful lot of time investigating these players personally. Our draft board will now have a lot of names of players on it; there'll be a much reduced number. We're going to try to make our scouts decisive and committed to people rather than just being able to pile guys into a category. We won't have that. I just want to get it in place so that I'm confident that that's going to be the process, and the implementation of that, that'll be someone else."
The energy level at practice definitely was higher than a typical Thursday, but then again, there has been nothing typical about this season. Linebacker Joey Porter, who signed with the Dolphins as a free agent after eight years with the Pittsburgh Steelers, noticed a change in not only the players but also the coaches.
"Yeah, guys were nervous out there. They got to run around a little faster and everything, coaches got to coach a little louder, so you definitely knew he was out there. It wasn't like a normal Thursday practice. I know it was our last Thursday practice of the year, but when the cameras were up in the stands, and I saw the vans outside when I came in this morning, everybody's been waiting for Thursday. We got the memo a long time ago that he was coming in on Thursday so we were waiting just like you guys were waiting."
Having played for Bill Cowher in Pittsburgh, Porter knows a thing or two about coaches in the mold of Parcells, and he definitely is impressed with Parcells' credentials and what he can do for the Dolphins.
"He's good at what he does. He's a football guy. He's a good evaluator. He know football, he knows talent, and whatever it is he can do to come in here to Miami and get this team turned around, I'm all for it. I just want to win, and he's coming from winning programs. He's known for building programs to win and we'll just all wait and see. This year's over. We've got one game to finish out and then we'll wait for him to do his magic."
Holliday concurs.
"This does bring new promise, new hope if you will to the organization. There are a lot of expectations," he said. "He's a guy who fixes problems and we have a big problem here and hopefully he's going to come in and I'll be a part of that and we'll get it fixed."
Football has been magic to Parcells his entire life, which explains why he keeps coming back into the league after swearing he was done on a number of different occasions. Sitting in front of the cameras and the reporters this evening, Parcells allowed himself to bare a but of his soul and didn't waver when asked why he took this job with the Dolphins.
"I quit being ashamed of what I am. I think I'm a guy that likes football very much. I've always liked it," he said. "I guess you call that maybe a male menopause, when you realize and you're no longer ashamed of what you are, and I think that happened to me many years ago really. I just can't get the game out of my system, really. I do love the game very much and I certainly have a lot of respect for the people that came before me that made this league what it is, and I honestly mean that."
He was also asked whether he not feels pressure to succeed
"Yeah, I do feel pressure. I don't mind saying that," Parcells said. "Anytime you're involved in anything I feel the same kind of pressure as Wayne feels and the coaches feel and the personnel people. When you're name's on it and it's not going too well it doesn't make any difference how many championships you've won or how many Super Bowls or how many division titles; you're not winning now. I do feel pressure to try to improve this situation and certainly I come here with an understanding that that's what I'm supposed to try to do. And I will tell the fans of the Dolphins that starting tomorrow morning that's what I'm going to be working on, and I will work on it as diligently as I possibly can. And I mean that."
He has proven to be a man of his word in the past and despite his age he feels energized and committed to the challenge that lies ahead.
INJURY UPDATE: Safety Travis Daniels (ankle), defensive end Jason Taylor (ankle) and nose tackle Keith Traylor (ankle) did not practice for the second day in a row ... For the Bengals, halfback DeDe Dorsey (ankle), center Eric Ghiaciuk (foot) and safety Madieu Williams (thigh) have been ruled out of Sunday's game ... Safety Dexter Jackson (calf), halfback Rudi Johnson (hamstring), wide receiver Glenn Holt (back) and cornerback Deltha O'Neal (coach's decision) did not practice ... Right tackle Willie Anderson (hamstring) was limited ... T.J. Houshmmanzadeh (ankle) and linebacker Dhani Jones (shoulder) participated in a full practice.
TAMING THE TIGER: Locker room interviews and a more thorough look ahead to Sunday's season finale against the Cincinnati Bengals with Geoff Hobson of Bengals.com will be among the featured items Friday on Miami Dolphins.com All-Access. The Internet radio show, co-hosted by Barry Buetel and Andy Kent, airs from 2-3 p.m., on MiamiDolphins.com and it also can be downloaded as a podcast.
http://www.miamidolphins.com/newsite/news/top_story.asp?contentID=5610