Following a mid-March meeting between Jerry Jones and Micah Parsons, the Cowboys owner was left with the belief that he reached an extension agreement with his star pass rusher. That deal obviously never came to fruition, ultimately culminating in last week’s stunning blockbuster trade with the Packers.
[RELATED: Micah Parsons Attempted To Restart Cowboys Extension Talks Prior To Trade]
Following that fateful meeting, Parsons’ agent, David Mulugheta, claims he made several attempts to resume negotiations with the organization. However, Jones apparently stuck to his apparent handshake agreement and refused to return to the the negotiating table.
“To expect somebody like Micah Parsons to be one of the best defenders in the NFL and also a great lawyer when it comes to contracts, I think it’s a bit unfair,” Mulugheta said during an appearance on ESPN’s “First Take” yesterday (via ESPN’s Rob Demovsky and Todd Archer). “His job is to go out there and chase quarterbacks, and our job is to go out there and chase commas for him. I’m not sure exactly why it went this way, but we were always prepared and open to negotiating a contract with the Jones family.”
Mulugheta made it clear that his client always wanted to remain a Cowboy, and despite the public stare down with the organization, Parsons would have suited up for Week 1 without a new contract. That made Jones’ refusal to resume negotiations especially frustrating for the player’s camp.
“If you’re a [then-]25-year-old football player and your boss, who happens to be the most powerful person in the NFL, starts talking about contracts, it’s hard for you to end that conversation,” Mulugheta said. “So they had a conversation. Micah nodded his head out of respect.
“Obviously there’s a power dynamic that’s a little different there. One guy’s the owner of the team and the GM, and the other one is Micah Parsons, a young 25-year-old football player. So, I’m not sure if there was miscommunication there by the time Micah walked out, but at no point did Micah believe that he was negotiating a contract.”
While there apparently wasn’t much back-and-forth between the two sides, it sounds like the Cowboys still had a definitive contract on the table. Jones claimed they offered Parsons a contract that would have made him the highest-paid non-QB in league history, and sources told ESPN that the offer exceeded $150MM. However, the main difference in the Cowboys’ standing offer and the four-year, $188MM deal Parsons ultimately accepted from the Packers was the length. As Mulugheta notes, the Cowboys were sticking to a five-year offer, a contract that the agent believes would have cost his client about $60MM to $70MM in future earnings.
There was also some belief that Jones was potentially circumventing CBA rules by attempting to negotiate with Parsons directly. The interim leader of the NFL Players’ Association, David White, seemed to tiptoe around the controversy when asked about the matter.
“We intend to enforce every provision of the collective bargaining agreement when we think that there may be a violation,” White said (via Rob Maaddi of the Associated Press). “And the best way to do that is to call people and say: ‘Knock it off.’ When both sides are able to do that, when needed, that usually makes for a productive management-labor relationship. When it doesn’t work, for whatever reason, that’s when you take it to the next level, which is to file a grievance to go to court, or to take whatever action is available to you under the collective bargaining agreement. In this instance, and here you’re talking about Jerry and Micah and their representatives and the other folks involved, I will say Micah has found his way to Green Bay with a contract that he has publicly stated makes him happy, and that makes us happy.”
One contender for the full-time NFLPA executive director job was a bit more pointed in his criticism. Hall of Fame cornerback Darrelle Revis took to social media to question whether Jones should be held accountable. Revis suggested that the NFLPA could look into a grievance against the Cowboys, although he acknowledged that the subsequent fine would only amount “to pennies.”
“At the very least, the NFLPA should be saying it does not condone what Jerry is doing, that all options are on the table, and reminding players that if ownership ever tries to deal with them directly while represented, they should contact their agent and the union immediately,” Revis wrote. “The bigger issue is respect. Jerry’s actions show that owners have no problem taking advantage of us, and when our union fails to respond, it sends the message that they’ll be able to do the same in the next CBA negotiations if the current leadership remains in place.”
Midweek fun fact: Dallas is the only part of Texas that’ll see Parsons’ new team Green Bay in the CBS doubleheader game this Sunday (9/7). The rest of Texas will see Houston and Los Angeles from the Rams’ house.
This is a huge issue and one that Revis is 1000% right about. Absolutely improper on the part of Jerry and he clearly tried to finesse an undermarket deal by going outside the CBA. I actually generally like Jerry and think he’s good for football….but he deserves losing a great player for taking such an egregious action.
The proposed deal was definitely NOT an undermarket deal.
One day, he won’t even be able to feed the worms right.
Just a wretched thing.
Easy to say he would have suited up now….
All these suits are the same – just sit on opposite sides of the table.
The agent is primarily full of BS. Micah’s not some naive little kid who didn’t know WTF he was involved in. Regardless of who broached the contract subject first in their conversation on a number of issues, Micah definitely knew what he was doing. Neither he or his agent denied that fact that Micah followed up that conversation by calling Stephen within a day or so after that to negotiate the numbers up even a little more. Was Micah a still a poor little naive 25 year old when he did that? Was Micah in over his head? You can make the case that he likely was, but he can’t claim he didn’t know what was going on. I do understand the agent’s wanting to hold firm on 4 years, rather than 5, but it’s pure BS that it would have cost Micah $60-70M in future earnings for the single extra year in a contract. The agent could have possibly backed the Cowboys down on the 5 years or got even more for the extra year, but he let the whole thing go on way too long before he swallowed his pride and called the team. The absolute final, extra long, nail in the coffin was when Micah’s bogus claim of back issues was shown to have no standing after an MRI and he flew to LA to purportedly get an equally likely bogus “second opinion” so he could claim he was too injured to practice and play in a game. If Micah really, really wanted to be a Cowboy for life he could have easily stopped the nonsense and made a deal. Both Jerry’s and the agent’s version of events are likely equally flawed and Micah let his ego purposely step in a pile of isht. He still comes out a multimillionaire, but he’ll freeze his ass off in GB, miss the bright lights and the HUGE Cowboys media attention he craves and lives for in the big city, and he’ll end up paying $M’s in state taxes he’d avoid in Texas. Adios amigo and good luck with that.