Bill Parcells tenure with the New England Patriots was a short lived one between the time of 1993-1996. When new owner, Robert Kraft took ahold of the team, there were reports of the two bumping heads and hardly reaching common ground. Parcells visited the “Dale and Holley” show and upon discussing his new book “Parcells: A Football Life” he opened up about his arrogant time with the Patriots.
“The first year and a half or so that I was there, there was a tremendous number of different agendas with the people that were in the organization,” Parcells said. “Nobody was really on the same page. … It was a very difficult situation, and then, of course, when a new owner (Robert Kraft) comes in, I didn’t really know what to expect, and I was a little bit jaded from my first-year experience, so I would say I had my guard up a little too much, and I wasn’t quite open-minded enough.”
“I think I left a good team there — I really feel like I did — with young players, some of who have gone on to be some of the greatest Patriot players ever,” Parcells said. “So that was difficult, and retrospectively, I’d probably do things differently. I think I was a little arrogant in that respect. I didn’t have a great understanding of some of the business aspects that were important to Bob at the time.
One would never confuse what Parcells did in his three years with the Patriots. In just two he made them a competitive team with a 10-6 record and first playoff game in 8 years. He’s a great coach. His arguments with Kraft were that of player development/choices for the team. Parcells book has been released since Oct. 28 and has awesome reviews.
(H/T NESN)