Parilli achieved his greatest professional success in the AFL as the starting quarterback of the Boston Patriots from 1961 to 1967. He earned three All-Star Game selections, while leading the Patriots to their only AFL postseason and championship game appearance in 1963. Present for the entirety of the AFL's existence, Parilli played his final seasons for the New York Jets and was part of the team that won a Super Bowl title in Super Bowl III. After retiring as a player, he served as a coach in the NFL, World Football League (WFL), and Arena Football League (AFL) from 1973 to 1997. He was inducted to the College Football Hall of Fame in 1982.
Parilli was the fourth overall selection of the 1952 NFL draft, taken by the Green Bay Packers.
He played two seasons with the Packers and was then drafted into the United States Air Force and to the Cleveland Browns. Fulfilling his ROTC commitment, he became a lieutenant in the Air Force and, like a lot of other pros, played service football. When his service was over he played a season with the Cleveland Browns in 1956, two more with the Packers, and another with Ottawa in 1959.
On April 4, 1961, he was part of a five-player trade that sent him to the Boston Patriots,[2][3] and he went on to become one of the AFL's most productive and colorful players. Playing for the Patriots from 1961 through 1967, Parilli finished his career with over 25,000 total yards and 200 touchdowns, ending among the top five quarterbacks in 23 categories such as passing yards, passing touchdowns and rushing yards. Parilli was selected for three All-Star Games. In 1964, throwing primarily to Gino Cappelletti, Parilli amassed nearly 3,500 yards passing with 31 touchdowns; the latter was a Patriots record until Tom Brady broke it in 2007. During that season's contest against the Oakland Raiders on October 16, he threw for 422 yards and four touchdown passes in a 43–43 tie. Parilli is a member of the Patriots All-1960s (AFL) Team.
Parilli completed his career with the New York Jets, where he earned a ring as Joe Namath's backup in Super Bowl III, when the Jets stunned the Baltimore Colts by a 16–7 score. Coincidentally, this gave the Jets two quarterbacks from Pennsylvania's Beaver County, with Parilli being from Rochester and Namath being from nearby Beaver Falls and both played for "Bear" Bryant in college, Namath at Alabama. In 1967, it was discovered by Life magazine that Parilli and several other professional athletes were regular patrons of Patriarca crime family mobster Arthur Ventola's major fencing operation called Arthur's Farm in Revere, Massachusetts. Despite the organized crime connection, journalist Howie Carr stated that there was never any inside information passed between Parilli and Ventola. Arthur was the uncle of mob associate Richard Castucci.
Besides his considerable skills as a quarterback, he was one of the best holders in the history of football and was nicknamed "gold-finger" as a result of kicker Jim Turner's then-record 145 points kicked in 1968 (plus another 19 points in the play-offs and in Super Bowl III). He is one of only 20 players who were in the American Football League for its entire ten-year existence, and is a member of the University of Kentucky Athletic Hall of Fame. In 1982, Parilli was named to the College Football Hall of Fame.
Because of their Italian surnames, the Patriots' wide receiver-quarterback duo of Cappelletti and Parilli was nicknamed "Grand Opera."
Parilli retired as a player at the age of 40 in August 1970.[4]
Parilli was elected to the College Football Hall of Fame in 1982.[7] On November 15, 2014, he was inducted into the National Italian American Sports Hall of Fame.[8]