Baffled Lions coach Steve Mariucci said Monday he didn’t know whether Joey Harrington or Mike McMahon would start at quarterback Sunday against the Bears and didn’t know when he would decide.
That left Mariucci a step behind Bears coach Dick Jauron, who said he would decide Wednesday between Chris Chandler and Kordell Stewart for the game between two 1-5 teams.
Mariucci’s problem is more vexing because he is in his first year with the Lions, making a decision on second-year first-round draft choice Harrington, the team’s so-called hope for the future.
Abandoning Harrington now would be surprising, but the Lions are as desperate as the Bears for a win. The right-handed Harrington has been playing with a dislocated index finger on his throwing hand since Sept. 21, but Mariucci doesn’t know whether the injury has caused Harrington’s poor decision-making in five straight losses. Two bad decisions on interceptions precipitated Harrington’s first benching of his short career in Sunday’s 38-7 loss to Dallas.
“I have to come to grips with whether his health is a factor or whether there are other factors,” Mariucci said. “I haven’t made up my mind. I want to visit with both quarterbacks.”
Even before the ugly Dallas outing, a scout for an NFC North team said Harrington “has regressed” since his promising debut under fired coach Marty Mornhinweg last season. Harrington won three of his first six starts before losing six in a row and 11 of his last 12, including this season.
“He’s throwing into coverage, and he doesn’t run like he can,” the scout said.
McMahon, a third-year quarterback, entered Sunday’s game in the second quarter but didn’t complete a pass until the fourth.
“His performance was not exactly what we needed or wanted,” Mariucci said.
Even notoriously patient Lions owner William Clay Ford expressed disgust after Sunday’s rout.
“This is a step backward,” he said. “We shouldn’t be making mistakes like that in the latter part of October.”
The Lions are playing without this year’s first-round draft choice, receiver Charles Rogers, out with a broken collarbone. Starting receivers Bill Schroeder and Az-Zahir Hakim caught one pass each against the Cowboys. Running back James Stewart is out for the season with a dislocated shoulder.
Mariucci did say he has ruled out starting the only veteran quarterback on the roster, Ty Detmer.
“We have a lot of time invested in Joey and Mike,” Mariucci said. “This warrants discussion.”
Mariucci met with Harrington on Monday and said he intended to talk to McMahon.
“I told him I want this job and I intend to fight for it,” Harrington said.
“Your guess is as good as mine,” McMahon said. “As players, you always want to play.”
Mariucci’s honeymoon with media and fans ended abruptly with the lopsided loss to another coach in his first year with his new team, the Cowboys’ Bill Parcells. Mariucci admitted his team’s lowly three first downs in the first three quarters was “shocking.”
The Lions won only five games in two years under Mornhinweg, but two came against the Cowboys.
Parcells’ lesson: Parcells is bad news for every struggling coach. His instant success with Dallas will cause owners everywhere to reassess their coaches. Coming off a 5-11 season, the Cowboys are 5-1, so evidently, coaching does make a difference.
Of the five coaches in their first season with a team, only Parcells is winning. Mariucci and Jacksonville’s Jack Del Rio are 1-5, Cincinnati’s Marvin Lewis is 2-4 and San Francisco’s Dennis Erickson is 3-4. After beating the Lions, Parcells explained what he believes he brought to the Cowboys.
“I try to always convince teams of the same thing, every team I’ve coached,” he said. “I try to teach them what causes you to lose games and what allows you to win, and then I try to have a team behave that way.”
Then he delivered the kicker, a blow to every coach who might think he has excuses: “And to understand there’s always a way to win a game. You might be outmanned . . . but there’s still a way to win if you can figure it out and implement it. I spend a lot of time trying to tell them what we have to do to win and the things we can’t do.”
Said wide receiver Terry Glenn: “He demands your attention. He wants your focus all on football. In practice, he’s not afraid to call you out. No one is above this team.”
Before the Detroit game, Parcells spent considerable time warning his players of a letdown.
“He really homed in on practice,” quarterback Quincy Carter said. “He called us up and told us once if we keep practicing like this, we would lose Sunday. He does things to keep us focused.
“We’re not good enough to look ahead on our schedule.”
But Parcells knows the toughest part of the schedule is coming up–at Tampa Bay, Washington, Buffalo, at New England, Carolina and Miami. But he also knows four of those six are at home. And he knows that no matter what, the 5-1 record has “helped our confidence.” The Cowboys know they can lose to anybody, but they also think they can beat anybody.
Nobody better: Tennessee quarterback Steve McNair is the consensus player of the year so far. He leads the league in passing yards, and the Titans are No. 3 in passing. No Jeff Fisher-coached team has ranked as high in passing at this point of a season.
Running back Eddie George used to be the focal point of the Titans’ attack, but no more.
“We’re winning,” George said. “That’s the beautiful thing about it. We’re going to ride No. 9 [McNair] all the way. If we throw the ball for 500 yards and get 5 yards rushing and we win, that’s all that matters.”
McNair’s fast start notwithstanding, the Minnesota Vikings have two candidates for player of the year. Randy Moss leads the league in receiving. Daunte Culpepper, back after nursing a back injury, passed McNair for No. 1 in passer efficiency rating. Culpepper, who led the league in interceptions last season with 23, has yet to throw one this year.
Wannstedt watch: The coaching record of Dave Wannstedt remains under close scrutiny in Miami, where Dolphins fans saw their team lose 19-13 to New England on Sunday.
Wannstedt missed a chance to go over .500 for the first time since the 1996 season finale in Chicago. His record of 77-78 trails all seven of his fellow coaches who entered the 2003 season with at least nine full seasons of experience.
Six of them–Denver’s Mike Shanahan (101-63), Pittsburgh’s Bill Cowher (118-78-1), Parcells (154-107-1), Atlanta’s Dan Reeves (199-170-2), Kansas City’s Dick Vermeil (102-95 before Monday night) and Seattle’s Mike Holmgren (120-77)–have reached or won a Super Bowl. The seventh is Marty Schottenheimer, who has a 167-117-1 record and three appearances in conference championship games.
Wannstedt has fared better in Miami than his 41-57 record during six years with the Bears. He has the fourth-highest winning percentage (.660) of any NFL coach since the 2000 season. Of the top seven, only Tampa Bay’s Jon Gruden and St. Louis’ Mike Martz have taken their team to the Super Bowl in that span.
