Two Bills drop the ball, Jets lose

The first Bill to drop the ball was Bill Parcells. Three years ago, in a controversial move with one year left in his contract, Parcells left the New England Patriots to become the head coach of the New York Jets. The Jets hoped Parcells might show them more loyalty than he showed the Patriots, but they probably should have known better. Three years into his tenure, just as the team was finally learning the Parcells system, he quit.

Admittedly, this football season started off bleakly for Parcells and the Jets. Leon Hess, who owned the team for over 30 years, died over the summer. Starting quarterback Vinny Testaverde went down with a season-ending injury 20 minutes into the season's first game. By week seven, the Jets, who last year were only five minutes away from advancing to the Super Bowl, had posted an absolutely horrific 1-6 record and essentially had no chance of making the playoffs.

But in the last few weeks of the season, things seemed to turn around. Ray Lucas, the third-string quarterback, played well and the team won seven of its last nine games, including their final four, all against playoff-bound teams. Jets fans hoped that this dramatic reversal of fortune would convince Parcells to stay on as coach for the next season. The team is talented and young with much future potential. But no, the Tuna wanted out. Why did he quit?

Parcells claimed that he was no longer happy with himself. At a team meeting, he read a poem entitled "The Man in the Glass." The poem begins, "When you get what you want in your struggle for self/And the world makes you king for a day/Just go to the mirror and look at yourself/And see what that man has to say." Parcells meant the poem to reflect his own inner torment, but all it reveals is his obsession with himself. From day one, he has only cared about the man in the glass and how much money that man makes.

Parcells also cited the evils of free agency as a reason for quitting. "The game is so much more transient now," he said at the press conference announcing his retirement. "Years ago, you had your guys. You developed them. You took 'em right through. Now it's more accelerated. You try to build the same thing on a yearly basis." Parcells, who has bounced from team to team at his own whim while remaining one of the highest paid coaches in the National Football League, is clearly not willing to put his money where his mouth is.

Less than 24 hours after Parcells quit, his replacement, defensive coordinator Bill Belichick, also quit. Belichick later filed a suit with the NFL asking to be released from the final year of his contact with the Jets, probably so that he can take over as the Patriots head coach.

Belichick claims that he quit because he was wary of the new owners, whoever they turned out to be. At the time Belichick quit, the Jets had no ownership; they have since been bought for $635 million by the heir of the Johnson & Johnson fortune. But with the possible exception of George Steinbrenner and Jerry Jones, owners usually have very little effect on the day-to-day operations of a team. Belichick just wants more money than the Jets will pay him, the chance to coach a slightly better team, and the opportunity to escape from his mentor's shadow.

Some sportswriters have hypothesized that the two Bills pulled their respective stunts in tandem. There is certainly much evidence to support this conspiracy theory. It now seems as if both men will get what they wanted. Parcells will most likely return to coach the Jets and get paid twice as much money, and Belichick will get his own lucrative head coaching position in snowy New England.

Whether we as fans should buy this hypothesis or not is irrelevant. The bottom line is that both Bills were unhappy, but instead of sucking it up and sticking it out, they quit. Like Buckner celebrating the end of the World Series just a little too early, these two Bills have looked forward to the cash they're getting next year rather than keeping their heads down and doing the best coaching job they could. The ball went through their legs, and the Jets lost.

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