Quarterback’s Most Demanding Critic is Parcells

He rides quarterbacks the way a jockey coming down the homestretch at the Belmont might treat his racehorse. As long as there’s even a slim chance of victory, Bill Parcells is going to his whip hand.

With his announced midweek switch back to quarterback Ray Lucas for Monday night’s game against New England Patriots, Parcells has made 11 quarterback changes in his 2 1/2-year tenure with the New York Jets. Seven of those switches happened though the previous week’s starter was healthy.

“Is it really that many--11 switches just since he’s been back in New York?” former Giants quarterback Phil Simms repeated Thursday. “Huh,” Simms said, his voice trailing off.

The greater curiosity right now isn’t the two players that Parcells is flip-flopping this week--the unproven Lucas or deposed starter Rick Mirer, who has proven once and for all during his lackluster trial here why three other NFL teams let him go. Neither will remind anyone of Vinny Testaverde.

The more useful question is what kind of quarterback would make Parcells happy? Ever? Every quarterback Parcells has had--the greats as well as the also-rans--are on a week-to-week audition. They all get reamed. It didn’t just start with these 2-6 Jets. During his previous stops with the Giants and Patriots, Parcells railed at Simms, berated Jeff Hostetler, and had some lacerating words for young Drew Bledsoe--and all three of them led Parcells-coached teams to Super Bowls.

So--again--what does Parcells want?

“Flawless perfection,” shoots back Glenn Foley, the once-upon-a-time Jets quarterback who’s now a backup for the Seattle Seahawks.

You laugh.

Foley doesn’t.

“When all the people that are trying to get the offense working perfectly get together during the week, Bill is not part of that. But then he’d pick up the sheet on Sunday and call all the plays. His assistants there--and Vinny , too--deserve a world of credit for making it easier for Bill. Because he’s not there running the thing and creating the offense every week. A lot of times Bill didn’t necessarily know the in and outs behind every play.”

A Tennessee Titans team spokesman said Thursday that Neil O’Donnell won’t talk about playing for Parcells. Bledsoe now swears he and Parcells had no hard feelings. Hostetler, who’s retired, didn’t return phone messages left Wednesday or yesterday. But Hostetler did tell an interviewer last year that he was stunned in 1997 when Parcells offered him the Jets quarterback coaching job because “he had never given me the slightest indication I had earned his respect when I was with the Giants.

“I have nothing but great things to say about the man as a coach,” Hostetler added, “but I didn’t enjoy one minute of my time with him.”

Simms says nearly the same thing.

“If I think back and look at it really hard, I had a rough relationship with him the whole time,” Simms said. “It was always hard. He was always pushing me, I never did understand him. I just took it like his way was the only way.

“When I look at it, I think shoot, I couldn’t still play now. I couldn’t be hit anymore, criticized every single day, evaluated for every single thing day after day after day. Players can take a lot. But it just comes a point where you finally say, I’ve had it. I’m not gonna let anybody criticize me anymore. I don’t want the pressure, I don’t need this, I want out.’ ”

Simms thinks that is what’s behind Parcells’ method just as much as wanting badly to win. Simms says Parcells targets and prods players who can “lift the entire team with their performance. It’s not just the quarterback.”

Laughing softly now, Simms tells a story about a game in which he and former Giants fullback Maurice Carthon, now a Parcells assistant, were standing on the sideline behind Parcells moments after gouging out a tough 70-yard drive that put the Giants at the 15-yard line. Parcells went for the safe three points on fourth-and-1--only to see his placekicker bend the chip shot wide.

“Well, I’m telling you, that poor kicker was still 20 yards from the sideline and Parcells was already screaming at him, ripping him, I mean, just killing the guy, cursing at him--it was unbelievable,” Simms said. “And Maurice and I, usually we would’ve been upset, you know, but we both just looked at each other and we couldn’t help but laugh.

“I’d never seen a placekicker get yelled at like that before. Everyone always says, Ooooh, you don’t yell at placekickers, don’t yell at quarterbacks.’ But Parcells turned on us now and he screamed, What? I can’t scream at the kicker? Who made up that rule? Huh? Who says I can’t?’

“I have to admit,” Simms said. “I thought, This is great.’ ”

Parcells does just want to win. If that means skewering some accepted axioms--like the notion that a quarterback needs to feel it’s his team--so be it. Thursday, asked what he wants in a quarterback, Parcells just mentioned accuracy, arm strength and decisiveness. Then he added, “I can tell you this. Guys that can’t hit what they’re throwing at don’t last long in this league.”

Parcells wants more. His quarterbacks have to catch what’s thrown back at them, too.