What did Parcells mean when he said; I don't coach penalties

[T-RO]

But tons of penalties is a reflection of the coach. Sounds like a cop out to me that he doesn't want any responsibility for how many they commit.

If your theory is that a beloved hall-of-fame coach was just looking to shirk his responsibilities as a coach...well...I'll have to say...that is one way of looking at it.

 

[The Realist]

Meaning he doesn't coach Tyron's choke hold on Spence or Doug Free's face mask.

 

[robbieruff]

Never quite understood that. Is he saying it's not my fault, I'm didn't teach them that or what?
Seems to me a coach would focus on technique stuff more (coach'm up) if penalties we're too often. But whom am
I do question Parcells wisdom.

Just referenced this in a recent exhange concerning our recent disturbing development of committing "unforced" penalty killing drives in the past few games - the most glaring example from my POV was the Free face mask penalty in the Bucs game. Just completely self-inflicted damage as he was in great position and was not needing to sustain the block but for a split second.

As others have posted here, there are several varieties of penalties. So-called "hustle" penalties where a guy is going full speed and just happens to commit a foul inadvertently vs. the sloppy ones as a result of mental errors or use of poor technique. I think it's pretty clear Big Bill was touching on the latter.

 

[links18]

He was calling his own players dumb. Well, maybe not the ones he brought in--maybe the players from the Jerry/Campo era.

 

[jrumann59]

Penalties are caused by many things, fatigue, emotion, being dumb, etc. Only ones I can accept is fatigue even though I would still find that unacceptable.

 

[jobberone]

Coaches coach and players play. You can teach them all day but some players won't, don't, a few can't listen well, and some just mess up. It's so ridiculous and probably arrogant to think every coach in the league doesn't coach players to not commit penalties.

 

[negativecreep]

Never quite understood that. Is he saying it's not my fault, I'm didn't teach them that or what?
Seems to me a coach would focus on technique stuff more (coach'm up) if penalties we're too often. But whom am
I do question Parcells wisdom.

I think he was saying he coaches them the right way, not to be dumb and hurt ourselves. Makes sense to me.