The New York Giants now have a formidable quarterback-head coach duo in Jaxson Dart and John Harbaugh. However, there was the fiery and often-charged partnership between former quarterback Phil Simms and veteran head coach Bill Parcells. Their rapport was infamous for its headline-worthy fights, including one in which Simms snapped.
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“He’s just going on. And I turn to him. I said, ‘Will you shut up?’ I said, ‘I’m so sick of you,'” Simms told NBC. “‘All you do is b**** and moan.’ You know what he does? He goes, ‘Everybody, Simms is mad at me.’ He did it, you know, he did it just like that. ‘Oh, he’s mad at me.’ Then he goes, ‘Do you want to hit me? Come on.’ Who would say that?
“And then I went, ‘Man, something’s wrong with you.’ And I just walked.”
Phil Simms broke out in the NFL years after he was drafted. But it was only after Bill Parcells, who was formerly the Giants’ defensive coordinator, was named head coach in 1983 that things turned around. Simms admitted that he knew things would change for the good with Parcells as head coach. But their relationship was not the best.
Parcells had yelled at Simms multiple times, but there was only one time the former quarterback really retaliated. The Giants were playing the Indianapolis Colts in 1990, and Simms threw an incomplete pass to Rodney Hampton, instead of targeting Dave Maggett, as Parcells wanted. The former head coach charged towards Simms and told him to sit his “b*** down,” and the exchange turned into a screaming match on national television.
“When we were playing real well as a team [Bill Parcells] was miserable because he needs friction,” Simms told ESPN. “He lives on that friction. He needs adversity, and he’s got to have a spat going with a player. If there’s no adversity, he’ll create it.”
Hilariously enough, Simms recalls that his teammates were very happy with his reaction, and even said that they’d want to talk to Parcells like that, too, if they could.
Bill Parcells was a no-nonsense coach, and he made life miserable for players during practice. He used to dunk footballs in soapy water to prepare the team for rainy games, forced players to wear long sleeves, and forbade players to wear tape around their cleats. Simms also told the Giants that practice “used to be the end of the world” for him. And when they had to play teams who were clearly underdogs, Parcells used to turn up the heat in practice.
“If you’re sensitive, you will have a hard time with me,” Parcells said when asked about his eccentric way of motivating players, according to ESPN. “The only players I hurt with my words are the ones who have an inflated opinion of their ability. I can’t worry about that.”
Parcells was always blatant with his players, saying that “athletes always say, all they want from their coach is honesty,” and that they should be careful what they wish for.
However, Parcells and Simms still had respect for each other. The quarterback knew that Parcells was the one who called the shots, and that there was a line he couldn’t cross because he was the head coach. That dynamic helped the Giants win two Super Bowls.
Just two days ago, the former head coach praised his former quarterback.
“The unique thing about my relationship with Phil was that we really, to a degree, have very similar personalities,” he said on Papa’s Perspective. “I think we both were highly competitive, from time to time, confrontational. But communication with Phil was never a problem. I loved having him as my quarterback. He’s my favorite quarterback that I ever coached, but mostly because of his competitive nature and commitment to winning.”