Micah Parsons should have been a Cowboys lifer. Instead, he's Jerry and Stephen Jones' warning shot

FRISCO, Texas -- There's a good chance Jerry Jones and the Dallas Cowboys wouldn't have traded All-Pro edge rusher Micah Parsons to the Green Bay Packers on Thursday if Parsons had taken a page out of quarterback Dak Prescott's playbook. 

The Cowboys owner and GM -- who is getting hammered for this trade -- admitted in a spontaneous press conference Thursday night that future Dallas players should follow Prescott's lead when they're looking for extensions. Parsons, who registered at least 12 sacks in his first four seasons played, didn't get one -- and it came down to tactics that Jones and his son, Stephen, were soured by. 

The magic bullet? 

"Ask Dak," Jerry Jones said with a wry grin. "Highest-paid man in the NFL. There's a lot of players that they could ask that have been paid around here. I'll pay players. ... We wanted to look and see if we could do what we did. That's the benefits of the trade. Make no mistake about it, we all know we could have signed Micah, but we decided to go with the trade."  

Parsons is the first player since sacks became an individual statistic in 1982 to have 12 or more sacks in each of his first four seasons (Reggie White did so in his first four seasons played but not in his first four years in the league). White was drafted in the 1984 supplemental draft but didn't play until 1985). Parsons' 330 quarterback pressures since being drafted 12th overall in 2021 are tied for the most in the league with Maxx Crosby of the Las Vegas Raiders, according to TruMedia. Parsons also leads the league with a 20.3% quarterback pressure rate (minimum 1,000 pass rushes) since 2021. 

The 26-year-old should have been a slam dunk to get re-signed. These negotiations should have been a no-brainer for Jones to get done. 

Micah Parsons, Packers' greatest acquisition since Reggie White, should similarly transform Green Bay defense

Zachary Pereles

The sticking point between the two sides centered around Jones' and Parsons' chats in the spring and how the saga devolved into hurt feelings. Parsons believed his talks were informal with Jones when the two parties were throwing around different contract points in conversation. Parsons then wanted to bring in David Mulugheta, his agent, to finalize the deal, but that upset Jones greatly. In the owner's mind, the negotiation had reached the finish line. That led to the talks going radio silent. 

"I really like Micah," Jones said. "I appreciate the four years we've had him here. He's a great player. No question, I could have signed him in April," Jerry Jones said. ... "This was by design. I did make Micah an offer and it wasn't acceptable. I honored the fact that it wasn't done how he wanted: through an agent."  

That's the opposite of how Prescott approached both the four-year, $160 million extension he signed in 2021 and the four-year, $240 million extension he signed hours before kickoff in Week 1 at the Cleveland Browns last season. The Jones family attempted to talk numbers with Prescott, but he immediately pointed Jerry and Stephen Jones to call his agent, Todd France.

"I never engaged in [contract] numbers [with Jerry and Stephen Jones]," Prescott remembered earlier this month. "There was a lot of engagement, especially on this last one. The first one, maybe not so much of anything, but this last one, yeah there were definitely some talks. Definitely different talks, particularly with Stephen, and they were great talks. They were phenomenal talks. ... They knew that I wouldn't have those [numbers] conversations with them."

Had Parsons done that, these negotiations likely would have gone much more smoothly, as Cowboys COO and EVP Stephen Jones also indicated. Parsons, going through his first contract negotiations post-rookie deal, simply didn't know better. That's why he's now a Green Bay Packer. 

"We do have players that come in, and we totally respect it, that say, 'I don't feel comfortable talking about my contract. I'd like you to go through my agent.' And we do that respectfully," Stephen Jones said. "I mean, you're not required to come in and negotiate the contract yourself. All the ones we've done like that are those who request to come in and visit with Jerry or myself. That's the only ones we've done that way."  

Despite the Cowboys eventually losing Parsons over a communication breakdown by negotiating directly with the All-Pro, the 82-year-old Jerry Jones doesn't plan on changing his tactics. Future Dallas players beware: never talk contract numbers with Jerry and Stephen Jones. 

"I don't think there's any question," Jerry Jones said when asked if he'll continue offering to sidestep players' agents to directly negotiate with players. "Once you are together, I've had hundreds of times and instances where literally hundreds over the last 35 years where the kinds of relationships I have with a player and the things we do, and that goes both ways. ... That's a natural thing to happen when you work together during times that bond you."