Cowboys, Parcells agree to four-year contract

IRVING, Texas -- Already sporting Cowboys silver and blue on his tie, Bill Parcells is back in the NFL as coach of a down-and-out Dallas team desperate to return to glory.

Parcells was introduced Thursday after more than a week of speculation and conflicting reports about a coach with a history of walking away from deals.

The two-time Super Bowl winner was hired three days after team owner Jerry Jones fired Dave Campo, saying he wanted a proven coach and a "change in philosophy."

"I realize this is a tremendous undertaking," Parcells said. "I wouldn't have done this if I wasn't committed to making the effort. I come here with a great deal of exuberance, enthusiasm and determination."

Parcells, who got a four-year contract worth about $17.1 million, will try to turn around a team that went 15-33 in the last three seasons. He is the first Cowboys coach with prior experience as an NFL head coach.

Dallas won the last of its five Super Bowls -- three under Jones -- in 1996 and hasn't had a winning record since 1998.

"I look forward to getting the team back to a place of prominence," Parcells, 61, said. "I became convinced that this was the opportunity at this time that was right."

Jones described Parcells as the "most qualified coach in our sport that you could draw up if you were drawing your own Rembrandt."

Parcells coached 15 seasons for three teams, taking the New York Giants, New England Patriots and New York Jets from losing records to the playoffs in two seasons.

The coach declined to say whether he would invite running back Emmitt Smith to return, or whether he would bring in a new quarterback. The Cowboys started two young quarterbacks this season.

Campo was fired Monday after being the first Dallas coach with three straight seasons of at least 10 losses. He also became the first coach to leave with a losing record, and the only one never to lead the Cowboys to the playoffs.

Jones first met with Parcells for five hours in New Jersey on Dec. 18, when the Cowboys still had two games left. They talked again for about six hours last Friday.

Parcells seems like a good pick to turn the team around.

The Giants were 4-5 in the strike-shortened season before Parcells took over in 1983. They made the playoffs his second season and won the Super Bowl in his fourth and eighth seasons.

In New England, he took a team that was 2-14 before his arrival and got them into the playoffs in his second season. They reached the Super Bowl in his fourth season.

Then he left for the Jets, which went from 1-15 without him to the AFC title game two years later.

With each of those teams, Parcells quickly established a good quarterback situation, something that has been lacking in Dallas with seven different starters the last three years.

Dallas still has NFL career rushing leader Smith, but the 34-year-old running back just finished his 13th season and, without a drastic pay cut, will count for nearly $10 million against the salary cap.

The Cowboys will have the fifth or sixth pick in the April draft, their highest since taking Russell Maryland as No. 1 in 1991.

Parcells would have automatically been a finalist in the Jan. 25 voting for the Pro Football Hall of Fame because he finished in the top seven in last year's balloting. But he will be removed from the ballot because a coach who is elected to the Hall must be retired for good.