Dallas Cowboys embattled wide receiver Terrell Owens says he wasn't taking a shot at Bill Parcells with his comments after the Cowboys head coach announced his retirement on Monday.
According to Tuesday's Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Owens described the locker room environment as difficult and that Parcells' old-school style of offense hurt the team.
"When I talked to [Parcells] for the first time we left an impression on each other. I still think he is a great guy. But he is like my grandmother. You love the person, but they are stuck in their old-school ways. You can't move them from their way of thought," Owens told the newspaper.
Owens spoke with ESPN Radio 103.3 in Dallas on Wednesday and claimed when he made mention about his grandmother it wasn't a shot at Parcells but that was basically saying the legendary coach is a guy that obviously has his ways of coaching.
Owens also told ESPN Radio he believed Parcells never went out of his way to improve their relationship and neither did Owens.
Owens says he tried to practice hard and play hard last season, but he did feel that Parcells mocked him during the preseason when he was injured.
"I think that by him saying that I need to get on the practice field and I that I needed to show him what I can do, I just felt him knowing the type of player that I am and what I've done to play through injuries I felt like he kind of made a mockery out of me in front of the media to say that," Owens said. "In that sense I kind of lost a sense of respect. But other than that I didn't allow it to deter me of how I practiced because I was seriously injured. "
Owens caught 85 passes for 1,180 yards and had a league-high 13 touchdowns. But he also topped the NFL with a league-high 18 dropped passes.
Owens said that hand injuries were to blame for some of the drops.
Though he often complained about offensive schemes throughout the season, he also played with an injured finger that required offseason surgery.
"I'll be the first to say that I didn't play as well as I should have. And you guys can talk about me all you want, it's really not going to change who I am as a person or a player," Owens said. "But I never said one time anything about my broken hand, anything about the torn tendon in my finger that I played thoughout the course of the year with."