Coach says week one is Bill Parcells fault

[MUSICCITY]

First of all Coach is an older gentleman who has coached in the college ranks as a defensive backs coach under Watson Brown. He retired at Vanderbilt years ago when Watson brown left the team in the 90's.

We often talk about football and being week one I asked him his thoughts about the games. He said its week one and its not as easy to understand as you might think.

He used the Giants and Redskins game as an example. He told me it was Bill Parcells fault the Redskins lost like they did to the Giants. I laughed and said you do know the tuna is in Miami don't you? He said yes but Tom Caughlin is a Parcells disciple and he runs his team a lot like the tuna.

Coach explained Parcells breaks the season down into quarters. He would give a player playing bad one quarter (four games) to fix it or he was demoted. He would look at churning the roster every four weeks. The coaches would start preparing for teams in that quarter, unlike the players who prepared from week to week. The stronger more important opponents would get more attention.

Coach said as an example in 2005 the cowboys on day one in OTA's were learning blitz pickup for the Eagles packages. The Cowboys played the Eagles in week four that year. So you understand, twelve weeks before they played they were practicing for the game. In those first four games Parcells saw the Eagles as the biggest threat and they got the most attention.

Fast forward to this year and look at the Giants first four games.

Washington,

St Louis

Cincinnati

Bye

Seattle

IF you had 8 weeks to prepare how would you prepare for this? ST Louis and Cincinnati are not good teams, Seattle is not a division game and after a bye at home. WASHINGTON would be the threat to the Giants.

Coach Believes the Giants were more prepared for the Redskins because of Parcells quarterly principle and the Giants competition or lack thereof.

He said some teams spend the extra time preparing for the first team they will play (he thinks Atlanta did). He said every team is different which is why week one looks so odd.

After week one every team has one week and the playing field is a little more even.

Coach said there were other factors but this was in his opinion why game one is not a great indicator to the season.

[dustinwhylee]

That's an interesting philosophy. I have no idea if Parcells and (apparently) Coughlin actually adapt that mentality but I personally like it. It prevents rash decisions and allows you to focus on primary threats per quarter.

[skinpride1]

Good theory !!! Real coaches prepare ahead of time. Al Saunders would game plan months before he played someone. Zorn is a newbie head coach. The man is trying to get the offense down. The most prepared coach on the skins would probably be the coach on special teams. Damn this newbie coach thing could set us back another two years. It's starting to feel like the 90's all over again. someone asks who do you pull for and i say skins and I'm starting to get the replies and looks again because people know we suck right now.

[commyderm2]

This is an interesting point of view and it explains alot.. I always remember that Bill Parcells teams, no matter how bad, always found a way to beat the first really good team they played.. Great post..

[turbodiesel#44]

Are you saying tuna gameplanned for us here instead of in NY, looking past us but at us, or are you saying he actually abandoned his normal advance planning and gameplanned the actual game he was playing in advance? Or did they just get lucky?

[Spear]

This "quarters" argument is negated by the fact that, ultimately, Coughlin chose to prepare most for the first game -- which is, I assume, exactly what we did. Both teams had the same amount of time to gameplan each other with an equal focus and the end result is that they punked us.

[ciscofan]

I like the thought behind it. Whether thats true or not, a single game can never be a true indicator as to how a team will perform all season long.

[Maximus71]

First of all Coach is an older gentleman who has coached in the college ranks as a defensive backs coach under Watson Brown. He retired at Vanderbilt years ago when Watson brown left the team in the 90's.

We often talk about football and being week one I asked him his thoughts about the games. He said its week one and its not as easy to understand as you might think.

He used the Giants and Redskins game as an example. He told me it was Bill Parcells fault the Redskins lost like they did to the Giants. I laughed and said you do know the tuna is in Miami don't you? He said yes but Tom Caughlin is a Parcells disciple and he runs his team a lot like the tuna.

Coach explained Parcells breaks the season down into quarters. He would give a player playing bad one quarter (four games) to fix it or he was demoted. He would look at churning the roster every four weeks. The coaches would start preparing for teams in that quarter, unlike the players who prepared from week to week. The stronger more important opponents would get more attention.

Coach said as an example in 2005 the cowboys on day one in OTA's were learning blitz pickup for the Eagles packages. The Cowboys played the Eagles in week four that year. So you understand, twelve weeks before they played they were practicing for the game. In those first four games Parcells saw the Eagles as the biggest threat and they got the most attention.

Fast forward to this year and look at the Giants first four games.

Washington,

St Louis

Cincinnati

Bye

Seattle

IF you had 8 weeks to prepare how would you prepare for this? ST Louis and Cincinnati are not good teams, Seattle is not a division game and after a bye at home. WASHINGTON would be the threat to the Giants.

Coach Believes the Giants were more prepared for the Redskins because of Parcells quarterly principle and the Giants competition or lack thereof.

He said some teams spend the extra time preparing for the first team they will play (he thinks Atlanta did). He said every team is different which is why week one looks so odd.

After week one every team has one week and the playing field is a little more even.

Coach said there were other factors but this was in his opinion why game one is not a great indicator to the season.

So what did the Redskins game plan for? the last game of the season?

[praise_gibbs]

So what did the Redskins game plan for? the last game of the season?

The Hall of Fame game still. Forget Osaka! We must remember Canton!

[zCommander]

Ok let me get this straight the Coach had such great insight but was not able to prepare his own team. What am I missing here???

[HailRiggoRanger]

This "quarters" argument is negated by the fact that, ultimately, Coughlin chose to prepare most for the first game -- which is, I assume, exactly what we did. Both teams had the same amount of time to gameplan each other with an equal focus and the end result is that they punked us.

That sums it up for me. Both teams had ample time to prep for the first game. I don't really think game planning against the Skins is too complex. On defense, stack 8 guys in the box and blitz. On offense, run off tackle, which sets up some nice play action later in the game.

[REDSKINS8181]

This "quarters" argument is negated by the fact that, ultimately, Coughlin chose to prepare most for the first game -- which is, I assume, exactly what we did. Both teams had the same amount of time to gameplan each other with an equal focus and the end result is that they punked us.

You're absolutely right, except for one thing: The Giants actually were at a disadvantage because they had no actual game film of our offense (preseason nonwithstanding), which makes that kind of loss all the more puzzling.

[bubba9497]

I thought it was because, we kept coming up a yard short on 3rd down :whoknows:

[guinnesscrazy]

I've had plenty of criticism for the coaches in Week 1, but the thought of Parcells affecting how the Skins played against the Giants is a bit asinine to me.

When it comes down to it, the players still need to step up. Game to game, I might think the coach is a fault for play calling, clock management, and other factors, but over a 4-game stretch of ineptitude, the players need to be held accountable. I have faith that the coaches will make adjustments to their mistakes, but if the players continue to fail in their approach, most of the blame should be put on them - and not on who was part of who's system once back in the day.

[turbodiesel#44]

So I guess Holmgren is why we lost then?

[RedlightG20]

So how did the Giants prepare for us? By watching our vanilla offense and defense during the preseason? A new head coach... things will be different. How do you prepare for that?

We just got punched in the face by a big Giants team. Simple as that.

[CBass1724]

If you think about it, the Giants had more time to prepare for us than we did.

Ok -- we both had the same amount of time (for the most part) but most of our time was spent on learning the new offense. The Giants aren't learning anything new for the most part so they had more "game planning" time than we did.

Training camp for the Skins was "learning what we do" instead of "taking what we know" and using it for strategic purposes, like gameplanning.

[Cooley4President]

So how did the Giants prepare for us? By watching our vanilla offense and defense during the preseason? A new head coach... things will be different. How do you prepare for that?

That was my thought as well. They could plan against our defense assuming it stayed the same under Blache, but what about the offense? Did they go off of what we showed in the preseason or what Seattle did? Some game planning may have been done, no doubt, but what beat us was being out-executed and out-played.

[ttr77]

Ah...so its Parcells' fault that the Giants were more prepared.

I guess the Skins were just focusing on the all-important Saints game in Week 2 instead of the Week 1 divisional matchup on national TV against the defending SB champs.

[MUSICCITY]

Ok I guess I left the part out about 2004 when the tuna took over, they used thier pre season installing the 3-4 defense and putting in a new passing scheme. They were not game planning for anyone untill week three of the pre season.

The Giants are a veteran team that had the luxury of preparing for just one team, and probably got a six week head start. That was coaches point.

[MUSICCITY]

http://www.blueandsilverreport.com/2008/09/04/beward-the-week-one-rush-to-judgement/

An opinion of Rafeal Vela a sports radio guy in Dallas that somewhat supports Coach.

[cavedude]

Good post. I took it to mean that Coughlin -- as a Parcells protege -- saw the Skins as the biggest game among their first 4 games. But that doesn't absolve the Skins from their poor performance...they had the same amount of time to prepare.

I heard Doc Walker on the radio a year or so ago say that Gibbs also broke the season down into 4 four-game quarters and that at the beginning of each new 4-game stretch they would change the ways plays were run from various formations. Evidently, most teams only look back at film from the opponents previous 4 games. So, Gibbs sought to gain an advantage in the early part of each season quarter.

[zoony]

I think sometimes- lots of times- people get so caught up in the details of the game of football, they lose sight of what it is on its most fundamental level.

The Giants pushed us around, period. Scheme had very little to do with it.

..

[texasthunder]

I can buy into the fact that they were suppose to be better prepared, in essence they only had three teams to prepare for in this season quarter. Since they have the bye week. Given that info and the celebration hoopla contributing to their emotion, they should have played better.

As for our team, we could have used the bye week as the first week :mad:

[gaskinsfan]

An interesting theory. I do think that the Giants schedule is pretty week for the next few weeks, so who knows, maybe they were more prepared than we were.

All I know is that Zorn, Campbell and the rest of the offense needs to up their game if we want to beat the Saints this week. We also probably need a few turnovers from the defense in order to win. I look for that to happen and the skins to win the home opener.