SALON

Monday, Apr 2, 2012 7:46 PM UTC

Parcells as Saints coach? OK with NFL commish

By

Topics: From the Wires,

Parcells as Saints coach? OK with NFL commishNFL Commissioner Roger Goodell is framed by New Orleans Saints hats during an interview before the grand opening of the NFL Shop at Draft store, Monday, April 2, 2012 in New York. Goodell said the league is meeting with players' union officials about possible player punishments in the New Orleans Saints bounty case. (AP Photo/Mary Altaffer)(Credit: AP)

NEW YORK (AP) — While NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell is deciding on punishment for players and listening to appeals in the Saints’ bounty case, he says he won’t stand in the way if New Orleans asks Bill Parcells to take over as interim coach.

“That’s their decision. They need to make those decisions and we’ll move forward,” Goodell said Monday at the opening of an NFL pop-up store featuring new team apparel. “Bill’s a great coach, and I’m sure will add a lot of personality and intrigue. And he’s as competitive as they get so I’m sure he’ll do a good job.”

Before the Saints pick someone to run the team this year, Goodell still has to rule on coach Sean Payton’s appeal of his season-long suspension, along with the appeals of shorter suspensions to assistant coach Joe Vitt and general manager Mickey Loomis and penalties handed down to the team.

Goodell expects to hear the appeals this week, and hopes to making a ruling shortly thereafter.

“Part of it depends exactly when the appeal is going to be, and second of all what information comes up in the appeal,” said Goodell, who has met with Payton twice before the appeal was filed.

Meanwhile, league officials were meeting with NFL Players’ Association representatives Monday about penalties involving players who took part in the bounty program.

The union has asked the NFL to provide it with all the information from the league’s investigation that revealed 22 to 27 defensive players were part of the Saints’ pay-for-pain bounty pool. The pool awarded thousands of dollars in cash bonuses from 2009-11 for vicious hits that knocked targeted opponents out of games.

One example, according to the league: Linebacker Jonathan Vilma offered $10,000 to any New Orleans player who sidelined Minnesota Vikings quarterback Brett Favre during the 2010 NFC championship game.

Goodell said the league has given the NFLPA two confidential reports on the investigation.

“I think we all need to move forward,” he said. “We’ve been open about what we’ve been able to find. We released it publicly.”

The commissioner said he’s hopeful the NFLPA will have a recommendation soon after meeting with league officials.

The results of the appeal could well affect whether Parcells comes out of retirement to take over as interim coach while his former offensive assistant and protege is suspended.

Parcells has said he would consider coaching the Saints if asked. Payton and Loomis played golf with the former NFL coach last week to talk to him about the team’s predicament.

Parcells, who turns 71 in August, led the New York Giants to two Super Bowl titles, and also coached the New England Patriots, New York Jets and Dallas Cowboys.

There has been criticism of Goodell for allowing Payton to participate in picking his successor, but the commissioner says the decision rests with Saints owner Tom Benson.

“These are management decisions that Tom Benson will have to sign off on,” Goodell said. “He will get recommendations, I’m sure from Sean and Mickey and others, and make his determination. If it ends up being Parcells, then they’ve gone through the full process.”

On Sunday, the NFLPA told players involved in the bounty case that there’s a chance they could face criminal charges and it hired outside counsel to represent them if needed.

Asked about possible criminal charges, Goodell said, “Those aren’t my decisions.”

“To me, we’re going to do what’s right,” he said. “We’re going to make sure our rules are enforced. And when they’re violated we’ll take the appropriate discipline.”

On March 21, Goodell suspended Payton for all of the upcoming season, Loomis for eight games, Vitt for six games, and former defensive coordinator Gregg Williams indefinitely, a penalty that will last at least one season. Goodell also fined the Saints $500,000 and took away second-round draft picks in 2012 and 2013.

Williams, who left the Saints after last season to join the St. Louis Rams, ran the bounty program.

It’s still unclear whether the appeals will change anything, but Goodell said Monday he’s open to new evidence. He noted, though, that the investigation has lasted years, in large part because the Saints didn’t come clean when first asked about the bounties.

“We’ve met with various personnel in the Saints, and for three years they denied that this was going on,” Goodell said. “It’s clear it was going on, and that’s one of the reasons the punishment was harsh. … They denied it repeatedly. And eventually we were able to get a credible source that came up late last year that gave us information that indicated clearly that it was going on.”

Even then, Goodell said, the Saints still denied it.

“We want to hear if there’s information we’re not aware of,” he said. “We’ll take that into consideration and we’ll deal with it from there.”

More Richard Rosenblatt.

Next Article

Related Stories

More Related Stories

Featured Slide Shows

The week in 10 pics

close X
  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11
  • Lisa Montgomery embraces her nephew Thursday after a tornado tore apart her home in Cleburne, Texas. The twister killed six people and destroyed entire swaths of the North Texas town.
    Credit: AP/LM Otero

  • Jack McMahon, the defense attorney for abortion doctor Kermit Gosnell, speaks outside the Criminal Justice Center Philadelphia Tuesday. His client was convicted of killing three babies in his clinic, and will serve multiple life sentences.
    Credit: AP/Matt Rourke

  • A photo taken Monday captures Vice President Joe Biden's response to a Milwaukee second-grader's innovative proposal to end America's epidemic of gun violence. This guy!
    Credit: AP/Jenny Aicher

  • Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., flanked by a grouper-eyed Michele Bachmann, addresses the IRS' admission that it targeted Tea Party groups in advance of the 2012 election. In an op-ed for CNN Thursday, the Kentucky senator slammed the president for his faux outrage.
    Credit: AP/Molly Riley

  • Ousted IRS chief Steven Miller is sworn in on Capitol Hill Friday. Miller testified before the House Ways and Means Committee on the extra scrutiny the agency gave conservative groups applying for tax-exempt status.
    Credit: AP/J. Scott Applewhite

  • Attorney General Eric Holder pauses as he testifies on Capitol Hill before the House Judiciary Committee Wednesday. Holder is under fire, among other things, for the Justice Department's gathering of phone records at the Associated Press.
    Credit: AP/Carolyn Kaster

  • O.J. Simpson sits during an evidentiary hearing at Clark County District Court in Las Vegas, Nev., Thursday. Simpson, who is currently serving a nine-to-33-year sentence in state prison for armed robbery and kidnapping, is using a writ of habeas corpus to seek a new trial.
    Credit: AP/Las Vegas Review-Journal/Jeff Scheid

  • Major Tom to ground control: On Sunday astronaut Chris Hadfield recorded the first music video from space, a cover of David Bowie's "Space Oddity."
    Credit: AP/NASA/Chris Hadfield

  • When it rains it pours. President Barack Obama speaks during a news conference Thursday with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, inexplicably inspiring an #umbrellagate Twitter meme.
    Credit: AP/Jacquelyn Martin

  • A smoke plume rises high above a road block at the intersection of County A and Ross Road east of Solon Springs, Wis., Tuesday. No injuries were reported, but the the wildfire caused evacuations across northwestern Wisconsin.
    Credit: AP/The Duluth News-Tribune/Clint Austin

  • Recent Slide Shows

  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11

Related Videos

Comments are not enabled for this story.

follow salon

Most Read

Popular on Reddit

links from salon.com

vote
Loaded terminology like "entitlements" and "welfare" skews the debate and alters America. How right-wingers use semantic tricks to kill government.
299 points300 points | 71 comments
vote
How right-wingers use semantic tricks to kill government -- "...much of the U.S. economic security support system consists of subsidies for the affluent in the form of tax breaks, like those for private retirement savings plans such as 401(k)s and private employer-provided health insurance."
48 points49 points | 3 comments
vote
Obstruction Will Ruin GOP - Playing politics & abusing the system can excite the extremes, but it's a recipe for long-term political disaster
32 points33 points | 1 comment
vote
With the help of Photoshop, artist Yao Lu has made shanshui — traditional ink paintings — of China's landfills
29 points30 points | 1 comment
vote
Temple Grandin on DSM-5: “Sounds like diagnosis by committee.” When it comes to autism, Grandin argues we're paying too much attention to labels -- and not enough to individuals
29 points30 points | 3 comments

From Around the Web

Presented by Scribol
listener_new_rect The Listener: So long, Sookie Stackhouse

Recommendations