Phil Parker Recalls Taking A Hit

Iowa Defensive Coordinator Still Recovering

Iowa Football’s Defensive Coordinator Phil Parker answers media questions Tuesday, Aug. 20, 2024 in Iowa City, Iowa. / Julia Hansen/Iowa City Press-Citizen / USA TODAY NETWORK

Phil Parker’s right arm is still in a sling.

For how long was going to be discussed when the Iowa defensive coordinator met with his doctor Tuesday afternoon.

“They say it’s six weeks,” Parker said when he met with the media after Tuesday’s practice. “But we’re negotiating that in another hour.”

Parker was injured when he was hit in practice a couple of weeks ago, and Tuesday was his first chance to meet with reporters, since he was unavailable for Iowa’s media day on August 9.

“Somebody bumped into me and they caught it at a bad angle,” Parker said on how the injury occurred. “Just kind of ripped it off the rotator cuff, a torn labrum and a (torn) bicep.

“No big deal.”

It was the first serious injury Parker has suffered in football, he said, noting that he was never hurt like that as a player.

“It’s unique,” he said, then added, with sarcasm, “It’s a great opportunity for me to use my left hand. And if you guys have never been there, you should try it sometimes.”

Sling or no sling, Parker is planning on being on the sidelines when the Hawkeyes open the season on August 31 against Illinois State at Kinnick Stadium.

There is a risk to being on the sidelines with such an injury, especially at Kinnick, where there isn’t a lot of room in the bench area, but Parker has no plans to coach from the press box.

“It’s hard to be up in the box,” he said. “I like to be down with my players. Look in their eyes, see what they’re thinking, and understand are they OK, do they understand what they’re doing, stuff like that. We’ve got such a short sideline, on our side, so I’ve just got to be careful. I’ve been doing this for a long time, but this is the first time I’ve had to have surgery for getting hit.”

Asked to rate the pain of the injury on a scale from 1 to 10, Parker said, “Five, six, I don’t know.”

Parker said he originally thought the injury wasn’t serious.

“I thought maybe I’d take a couple of days, see if I could loosen it up a little bit,” he said. “Then, after I got the surgery, it was a little bit worse than I thought. At least that’s what the doctor says.”

Parker said he didn’t think about taking any time off with the injury, or delaying the surgery.

“There’s not too many summers left for us old guys,” he said. “I want to make sure I enjoy my summers. I was going to be busy and tied up here, so it was probably the best thing to do.”

Asked if by being out on the field with the injury, it would be a motivational tactic for his players, Parker said, “As you get older, you can’t do that much. 

“There’s injuries, and then there’s pain. Do you have pain, or is it truly an injury, and do you want to take care of it? So I think everybody knows the difference of that. Sometimes, when you're going out here and practicing preseason like we are, we get banged up a little bit, hitting each other and stuff like that, so there's soreness. But no, we're pretty healthy here on defense, I think, right now.”