Gang Green Nation
Late last week superstar Dallas Cowboys edge rusher Micah Parsons requested a trade from the team.
If you haven’t been following this story, the extent to which the Dallas Cowboys have botched this situation has been truly staggering. Negotiating an extension with a player of Parsons’ caliber should be simple. He’s one of the handful of players in the league where a market resetting extension is still a good value. Instead, the Cowboys have dragged their feet and taken negotiations into public.
We have awards for players, coaches, and executives. There are currently no awards for owner performance. If there was a honor for most incompetent owner of the year, (Let’s call it the Woody Johnson Award.) Jerry Jones would have already built up an insurmountable lead for 2025.
The Cowboys have said they won’t trade Parsons. Time will tell. These ugly contract standoffs frequently get pulled from the precipice when a team realizes it can’t afford to lose a player and finally relents with a big contract offer. Bad feelings can smooth over quickly.
It’s certainly possible that will be the case here. It depends on Dallas coming to its senses. But there are no guarantees.
As a Jets fan, you develop a sixth sense for understanding when an owner is damaging his team in a profound way. It seems like Jerry Jones is going out of his way to make this feud personal with Parsons. That could potentially damage the relationship beyond repair and force Dallas to trade him.
Whenever a big name player enters the market, the same question pops up. Should the Jets be interested?
In the case of Parsons, the answer is easy. All 31 non-Dallas teams in the league should all be interested.
One of the things I frequently discuss here is the need for teams to build through the Draft and develop homegrown talent. There’s a simple reason for that. Players like Parsons almost never become available.
You can find under the radar guys like DJ Reed in free agency.
But when big names become available, there is usually a catch. Many of them are old and declining like Aaron Rodgers, Dalvin Cook, and Tyron Smith. Others come with big injury risks like Mike Williams. Maybe they come with a different risk like Le’Veon Bell, who sat out a full season just before he signed with the Jets. Or there’s somebody like CJ Mosley, a very good player but one who just doesn’t play a position that moves the needle.
The Jets are a cautionary tale in constantly chasing after the shiny object. I just gave you any number of different cautionary tales from transactions made over a five year stretch. These are among the common reasons it’s a bad idea to chase numbers.
In Parsons you have the exception to the rule in the NFL, a truly high impact, transcendent player entering his prime years. Outside of quarterback, there arguably isn’t a player more valuable in the NFL than an elite pass...
