Norm's year

It's apparent Norm Parker has immersed himself in Georgia Tech.

A few different times during a Friday afternoon news conference, the 68-year-old Iowa defensive coordinator move his paper Coke cup to where the strongside linebacker should be. His hands danced around the table. He even started reaching for recording devices.

Parker is into this triple option “flexbone” thing that Paul Johnson has humming at Georgia Tech, Iowa's opponent in the Jan. 5 Orange Bowl.

“You've only got 11 guys out there,” he said, arms and hands flying. “When they're balanced, you've got to play five and a half guys over there and five and a half guys over there.”

No word on who the “half guys” might be.

Parker is so into this that he fights through pain and wheels around the Iowa football complex in a wheelchair.

The foot problems that took him off the field after the Michigan State game on Oct. 24 haven't let up. After having a toe amputated due to infection this summer, the wound never fully healed. Parker, a diabetic, pushed his health to the limit. It caught him after Michigan State.

“We tried to get through the year and do something after the year,” said Parker, who lost a toe due to diabetes in 2004. “After the Michigan State game, I went into the lockerroom, they took off my shoe and it was full of blood.”

Parker went to the UI Hospitals and Clinics the next day. The toe was “sewed up” again. Parker was put in a cast and “put my ass in bed.”

“He (the doctor) said, ‘Now you can't walk on it at all,'” Parker said.

For Iowa's next game against Indiana on Oct. 31, Parker coached from the press box. The problem now is that his leg has atrophied, which is why he's still in the wheelchair and still slow getting around.

He'll likely coach the Orange Bowl from the press box.

“Hell, I fell down in a snowbank the other day and couldn't get out of the snow bank,” he said. “Some guy driving by in a car had to stop and help me up. I'm sort of a feeble old man right now.

“My wheelchair is right outside the room."

Parker joked about coaching from the press box.

"It's warmer up there and you can eat," he said with a laugh.

His preference is to be on the field, though. He disputed the notion that coaches can see the game better from the press box.

"Hell, I watch practice everyday from the field," he said. "It's not like when you're on the field you've got your eyes closed, but you are away from the players. I like to be able to talk to the players.

"Up in the press box, it's like you're watching a game from inside a closet. There's no noise, there's no anything up there. You might as well watch it on TV and turn the sound down."

Parker didn't want Friday to be his life and times. He has really dialed into Tech.

He made specific mention of B-back Jonathan Dwyer, who leads the Jackets with 1,346 yards with 14 rushing TDs. He described, with the help of a few props, the dangers of A-backs Anthony Allen (6-0, 231), who has 597 yards and averages 9.8 yards a carry, and Roddy Jones (5-9, 195).

Of course, quarterback Josh Nesbitt (991 rushing yards, 18 rush TDs and 1,689 passing yards) makes it all go. Parker added that wide receiver Demaryius Thomas (6-3, 229) is "as dangerous as anyone on their team."

"In all of the time we've been here, there's never been a team that'll make the players study film and concentrate every play as much as this team will," Parker said. "This team will take more on-the-field preparation, but the guys will have to watch film on their own more than any team we've played.

"If you don't do that, you won't win. You can't think about football an hour and a half a day and play these guys or they will go up and down the field on you."  

These are not the words of a man who's considering retirement.

Parker said Friday he plans to coordinate Kirk Ferentz's defense next season.

"If I didn't think I could do it, I'd be the first guy to say, that's it," Parker said. "I don't want to do it, if I don't really believe I can do it. That's not fair to the team and that's not fair to the other coaches. I don't want to try to do something that I know I can't do.

"When I think I can't do it, this cowboy's heading the other way.

"I'll be the first guy to say, that's it guys, I'm done. I don't want to be that guy who hangs on longer than he should hang on, which maybe I already am, who knows?" 

Judging by the performance of the '09 defense -- echoing Parker's call for "six seconds of hell" -- Parker is not that guy.

Far from it.