Latest / Rosters to Rings Podcast / Special Episode - Micah Parson's Trade Reaction

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Special Episode - Micah Parson's Trade Reaction · Rosters to Rings Podcast

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Speaker 1: Welcome to a special episode of Rosters to Rings where
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Speaker 1: we break down the incredibly impactful trade between the Green
0:08
Speaker 1: Bay Packers and the Dallas Cowboys. Micah Parsons heads to
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Speaker 1: Green Bay, Kenny Clark and two first round picks come
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Speaker 1: back to Dallas. Let's discuss it here on Rosters to Rings.
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Speaker 1: Alongside Tom toe LESCo, I am Thad Levine. We are
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Speaker 1: ecstatic to be joined by Jeff skin Wade of the
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Speaker 1: famous Ben and Skin Show. In addition to being an
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Speaker 1: accomplished media mogul and a well above average basketball player,
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Speaker 1: Skin represents the heartbeat of the Dallas Fort Worth Metroplex
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Speaker 1: fan base. No one is more knowledge of and passion
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Speaker 1: for sports and greater Dallas than does Skin. But I
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Speaker 1: want to start the conversation here with Tom Bombshell dropped
0:51
Speaker 1: yesterday in the NFL. Micah Parsons traded by the Dallas
0:54
Speaker 1: Cowboys to the Packers for Kenny Clark and two first
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Speaker 1: round picks. Give our listeners a a general manager's view
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Speaker 1: of this deal? What what does the value as you
1:03
Speaker 1: assess it?
1:04
Speaker 2: Well?
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Speaker 3: First of mean where to start? I mean, I just
1:07
Speaker 3: I just finished three hours on NFL Radio and all
1:10
Speaker 3: we talked about was the trade, how it affects Doles,
1:13
Speaker 3: how it to affects Green Bay, what went into it.
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Speaker 2: And this has been a huge story, and.
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Speaker 3: It's this one's so unique because there's so much different
1:20
Speaker 3: than the Hendrickson holdout in Cincinnati and the McLaurin holdout
1:24
Speaker 3: in Washington. This one has just played out differently, not common.
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Speaker 3: And I guess the facts were kind of right in
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Speaker 3: front of our eyes because obviously Michaeh he was not
1:34
Speaker 3: going to play on this contract.
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Speaker 2: That you could tell that was a fact. The other
1:38
Speaker 2: fact was there was.
1:39
Speaker 3: No communication between the Cowboys and his agent. So if
1:44
Speaker 3: you add those together, I don't see how a deal
1:47
Speaker 3: could get done. So what's the alternative. It's going to
1:49
Speaker 3: have to be a trade. And that's the route they went. Now,
1:52
Speaker 3: they must have changed their minds at some point because
1:54
Speaker 3: it looked like, uh, they were trying to sign him
1:58
Speaker 3: way back in the spring and then through the summer,
2:01
Speaker 3: and that number was going to be big. They knew that,
2:04
Speaker 3: and it seemed like they were fine with that. That's
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Speaker 3: how we're gonna build it. You know, we're gonna put
2:08
Speaker 3: a lot of money into two or three into three players.
2:12
Speaker 3: But at some point they changed their minds. So, you know,
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Speaker 3: the hard part is getting back true value for a
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Speaker 3: player like his, with his ability and his youth. It's
2:21
Speaker 3: hard to do. But what they're gonna do is they're
2:24
Speaker 3: going to try and add the draft picks, add the
2:26
Speaker 3: cap space, and from green Bay standpoint, it's it's really
2:30
Speaker 3: interesting just because they've been building towards this for the
2:33
Speaker 3: last couple of years. This hasn't just been like a
2:35
Speaker 3: couple of weeks where they look at it and they see, hey,
2:37
Speaker 3: there's a premier pass rusher.
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Speaker 2: Let's go after him.
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Speaker 3: They've been trying to acquire a veteran pass rusher for
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Speaker 3: a long time.
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Speaker 2: But there they're GM.
2:45
Speaker 3: Brian Goodikuantz has has kind of lined them up to
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Speaker 3: do this right now. They have a pretty young roster,
2:50
Speaker 3: they have a lot of players and Murkey contracts, so
2:53
Speaker 3: it gives them the flexibility when this game available because
2:55
Speaker 3: it's a big price tige this time of year and
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Speaker 3: now a lot of teams are budgeted cash and cap
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Speaker 3: wise to add a player of this magnitude, well, they
3:02
Speaker 3: were ready to do it. So he's going to make
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Speaker 3: a good defense even better, you know, I know, Dallas said,
3:08
Speaker 3: they'll be better without Mike. I mean that's not reality
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Speaker 3: right now. I mean down the road, if some things
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Speaker 3: happen with the money that they now have to spend
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Speaker 3: in the draft picks, maybe you can say that. But
3:18
Speaker 3: right now they're obviously not going to be as strong.
3:20
Speaker 3: And it just is what it is. But it's been
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Speaker 3: a really interesting whole dynamic just because there aren't a
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Speaker 3: whole lot of negotiations that don't have the agent involved,
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Speaker 3: not that I've been a part of, unless the player
3:31
Speaker 3: doesn't have an agent. So this was different than the
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Speaker 3: Cowboys have done it different ways, And I'd love to
3:35
Speaker 3: hear from Skin too, because I know the Cowboys in
3:39
Speaker 3: the past. They've done plenty of big deals with their
3:40
Speaker 3: own players, so they've done these before they negotiate with agents.
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Speaker 3: I just don't understand this was different for whatever reason.
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Speaker 2: And you know why was an agent part of this?
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Speaker 2: But they're agent's part of the other deals.
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Speaker 3: That's you know, from the outset looking in, I don't know,
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Speaker 3: And I do this for a living, trying to handicap this.
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Speaker 2: Not really sure why that was the case, but that
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Speaker 2: seemed like that was the case with this such.
4:01
Speaker 1: And Skin I think let's circle back to that point
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Speaker 1: in a second. Just just give us the level set, like,
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Speaker 1: what what is the the millions of diehard Dallas Cowboy fans?
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Speaker 1: How are they feeling today?
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Speaker 4: They feel triple gutted for a lot of reasons. One
4:18
Speaker 4: as I think the fan base, you know, there's a difference.
4:21
Speaker 4: The NFL is the biggest animal by far. But you know,
4:25
Speaker 4: if you live in Dallas, you're a Mavericks fan and
4:27
Speaker 4: a Rangers fan, and you're a Cowboys fan and a
4:29
Speaker 4: Stars fan. And so this is a sports fan base
4:33
Speaker 4: that is still reeling from the Luca trade. And so
4:37
Speaker 4: you have the best player on your team for both
4:41
Speaker 4: franchises changed before they enter their prime or as they
4:44
Speaker 4: enter their prime. And it seems to be for reasons
4:48
Speaker 4: that you, you know, whatever you want to project on it.
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Speaker 4: A lot of people project ego onto this this sort
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Speaker 4: of thing, and I think, you know, I'm not trying
4:58
Speaker 4: to be a sin a cool, grumpy guy, but we're
5:02
Speaker 4: on thirty years of this behavior from the Dallas Cowboys,
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Speaker 4: So I'm emotionally speaking, I'm unfazed by it. I you know,
5:13
Speaker 4: it's the problem is the logic with which the Cowboys
5:17
Speaker 4: use to do things. They don't seem to have a philosophy.
5:19
Speaker 4: They yank it all over the road. Let me ask you, guys,
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Speaker 4: and you know, name a superstar player the Cowboys drafted
5:27
Speaker 4: since Jerry Jones has been there that they didn't keep.
5:30
Speaker 4: I don't think there's one. You know. I'm not going
5:33
Speaker 4: to sit here and say DeMarco Murray was a superstar.
5:35
Speaker 4: He was a good running back. I remember not being
5:38
Speaker 4: he went within the division. And it didn't bust me
5:40
Speaker 4: up that they if you are a superstar, Jerry keeps you.
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Speaker 4: He may do this, you know, little routine that he
5:48
Speaker 4: does and say the things and love all the juice
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Speaker 4: and all the talk about it, but they get the
5:53
Speaker 4: guy done. You could have made an incredible argument, and
5:55
Speaker 4: we did on our sports talk show. I didn't want
5:58
Speaker 4: to resign Ezekiel Elliott, not because I don't think he
6:01
Speaker 4: was a great player, but I personally never give a
6:05
Speaker 4: running back excuse me that second contract. And I mean
6:09
Speaker 4: there's some guys like Saquon I get it, but they're
6:13
Speaker 4: so rare, and Ezekiel wasn't that guy. He showed signs of,
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Speaker 4: you know, starting to diminish a little bit. So you
6:20
Speaker 4: don't do that with that position. What you do is
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Speaker 4: you franchise him, and if it upsets the apple cart,
6:25
Speaker 4: so be it. But that's not how the Cowboys just
6:27
Speaker 4: don't have a good philosophy. And this if you had
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Speaker 4: told me right before the draft, we're gonna trade Micah Parsons,
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Speaker 4: you I can understand that and you can make it
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Speaker 4: make sense to me because you can't have two of
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Speaker 4: the top seven highest paid non quarterbacks in the NFL
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Speaker 4: and the highest paid quarterback in the NFL. That stupid business.
6:50
Speaker 4: So if you had done it going into the draft,
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Speaker 4: when you can put a good deal together, I get it.
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Speaker 4: That's not what happened here. This is ego and we've
7:00
Speaker 4: seen it play out year after year after year. And
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Speaker 4: I don't know if you guys watched it, but we all,
7:06
Speaker 4: just as our community, just watched this Netflix special, which
7:10
Speaker 4: is eight episodes of Jerry Jones's Flawed and his ego
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Speaker 4: has drug fan bases through the mud for thirty years.
7:17
Speaker 4: And it happened again. This trade happened because Jerry insulted
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Speaker 4: that agent, and guys, I know way more about the
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Speaker 4: NBA than the NFL, and Tom I might be speaking
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Speaker 4: out of turn here, but what I see in the
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Speaker 4: NBA is when you upset the agent, he gets you
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Speaker 4: out of there and he gets you where he wants
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Speaker 4: you to be. And Jerry took ridiculous shots at that agent,
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Speaker 4: disrespect him. And this isn't some third rate agent. This
7:48
Speaker 4: is a big time guy with big time clients. And
7:52
Speaker 4: you know who some of his biggest clients are. They're
7:54
Speaker 4: in Green Bay, like Jordan Love. And so you don't
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Speaker 4: make a deal like this a week before the season
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Speaker 4: starts because there's, like Tom said, there's so few teams
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Speaker 4: that can do it. This was an ego deal. And
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Speaker 4: now the ego you've gone to the edge of the
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Speaker 4: cliff and Jerry's not going to back down as he's
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Speaker 4: insulting everybody. And you guys saw Tom, you say you
8:16
Speaker 4: saw how Mike was acting. They they traded a generational
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Speaker 4: pass rusher a week before the season because ego got
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Speaker 4: in the way. This is the kind of thing that
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Speaker 4: drives Cowboys fans bonkers.
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Speaker 1: I tell you what, when you're introduced is having tremendous
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Speaker 1: passion and knowledge. That's how you deliver people in their
8:36
Speaker 1: company statement, That's how you deliver. Hey, Tom, I want
8:40
Speaker 1: to I want to ask you, like a practical logistics
8:43
Speaker 1: question that Skin just touched upon, which is part of
8:46
Speaker 1: the challenge here building a team. You know, in Bill
8:50
Speaker 1: Barnwell's article today at ESPN, he cited the fact that
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Speaker 1: no team has had a winning season in which they're
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Speaker 1: allocating fifty percent or more of their cap to three players. Wow,
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Speaker 1: cd Am, Dak Prescott, and now Micah Parsons. Did they
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Speaker 1: invest in the right guys? It was my first question
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Speaker 1: to you, and then Skin, I want to kick it
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Speaker 1: back to you. You kind of alluded to a lot
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Speaker 1: of this, but why were they able to get to
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Speaker 1: yes with the first two guys and not with Micah Parsons.
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Speaker 3: Well, first to go with Bill Barnwell does excellent stuff.
9:21
Speaker 3: By the way, I wish I knew how many teams
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Speaker 3: have had that that much cap. I mean, it may
9:26
Speaker 3: only be a couple teams, So you know, I'd like
9:28
Speaker 3: to see like the the actual numbers with that. But
9:32
Speaker 3: I'm not saying you can't do it. I mean you
9:34
Speaker 3: have to draft really well, and you have to have
9:36
Speaker 3: a lot of players on your contract on your roster
9:39
Speaker 3: that are on rookie contracts, and that's that's can kind
9:42
Speaker 3: of get you that path where you can spend a
9:43
Speaker 3: lot on some other players if you have to pay
9:45
Speaker 3: your quarterback. When I was with the Chargers, I knew
9:49
Speaker 3: once we paid Justin Herbert, we're we have to transition
9:52
Speaker 3: and have more younger players on offense and defense, and
9:55
Speaker 3: more rookie contracts because lower base salary, lower cap numbers.
9:58
Speaker 3: We started that process before we signed him. So not
10:01
Speaker 3: saying you can't do it, but it does make it
10:03
Speaker 3: more difficult as you put your team together when you have,
10:06
Speaker 3: you know, three players making that much money, but if
10:09
Speaker 3: it's your franchise quarterback and a pass rusher and a receiver,
10:12
Speaker 3: at least you're paying the right people and they're paying
10:14
Speaker 3: their own, which is even better. They know what they're getting,
10:18
Speaker 3: They drafted, they developed, and then that you want to
10:20
Speaker 3: pay your own.
10:23
Speaker 4: And to jump in there, I think, and Tom brought
10:25
Speaker 4: it up. You know, when you do pay Dak and
10:29
Speaker 4: we that's a discussion that happens in every city unless
10:32
Speaker 4: it's like no brainer. Patrick Mahomes, you know, we had
10:35
Speaker 4: so many discussions on the radio, all right, how good
10:38
Speaker 4: is Dak? And we usually settled in all right, he's
10:40
Speaker 4: probably somewhere between the eighth best quarterback and the fourteenth
10:44
Speaker 4: best quarterback, and if you have the right team around him,
10:46
Speaker 4: you can win. You could make the argument two seasons ago.
10:49
Speaker 4: You know, Dak got hurt last year, but two seasons
10:51
Speaker 4: ago he was MVP runner up, right, If he has
10:55
Speaker 4: the right guys around him, you can absolutely win a
10:58
Speaker 4: Super Bowl with that Prescott. The problem is, and by
11:02
Speaker 4: the way, the Cowboys I believe have drafted pretty well
11:06
Speaker 4: the last five or six seasons, but there are two
11:09
Speaker 4: horrific first round misses and they both happen to be
11:12
Speaker 4: on the defensive line. Taco Charlton Charlton. Instead of drafting Watt,
11:17
Speaker 4: which you know every team's got, you could have taken
11:19
Speaker 4: this guy. That's so be it. Everybody in the league
11:22
Speaker 4: pasted on Tom Brady whatever. Like, everyone has their misses
11:24
Speaker 4: that happens, but missing on Taco and then missing on
11:29
Speaker 4: Mazzie Smith when they absolutely are so thin at defensive
11:33
Speaker 4: tackle really really hurt this team. If they had hit
11:36
Speaker 4: on even one of those guys. You you know, to
11:39
Speaker 4: Tom's point, you look at it differently. If you've got
11:41
Speaker 4: guys on rookie contracts that are filling those other holes,
11:45
Speaker 4: then you can be top heavy but the Cowboys weren't,
11:49
Speaker 4: and so you know, I look at it, and if
11:53
Speaker 4: you are going to put all that money in Dak,
11:56
Speaker 4: I think you have to give him one dynamic at
11:58
Speaker 4: least one dynamic weapon. And then they made the Pickings deal,
12:01
Speaker 4: and let's see how that works out. I mean, that's
12:04
Speaker 4: a mer curial guy. You know, they're going to have
12:06
Speaker 4: to decide if they want to give that guy a
12:07
Speaker 4: contract at the end of this year. But they are
12:11
Speaker 4: so thin, like they're thin at linebacker, they're thin at quarterback.
12:15
Speaker 4: They paid Trayvon Diggs at the time when they signed Digs,
12:18
Speaker 4: I didn't have a problem with it, and then Diggs
12:19
Speaker 4: has been hurt ever since. Right then they got lucky
12:22
Speaker 4: because Deron Bland can absolutely play. So that's the nature
12:27
Speaker 4: of the game. Sometimes you hit on some guys you
12:30
Speaker 4: didn't think they step up, and then sometimes you miss
12:33
Speaker 4: at the top. But I go back to that just
12:36
Speaker 4: looking at the list that I saw today with Micah
12:40
Speaker 4: and Ceedee Lamb both on it, and then you know
12:42
Speaker 4: how much money is going towards Dak. I just don't
12:45
Speaker 4: think the Cowboys have done well enough in other areas
12:48
Speaker 4: to justify that. But again, nothing has changed since last
12:53
Speaker 4: February or March. You knew that back then. They were
12:56
Speaker 4: still trying to give Micah this deal a week ago.
13:00
Speaker 4: Right Like, if my kid just said, oh yeah, I'll
13:02
Speaker 4: take whatever deal me and Jerry shook hands on before
13:05
Speaker 4: they shut my agent out, they would have paid all
13:07
Speaker 4: three of those guys that money. They were going to
13:10
Speaker 4: do that. So today to say, well, we got a
13:14
Speaker 4: thirty year old tackle that's coming off of an OK
13:17
Speaker 4: year and a couple of first round picks for a
13:19
Speaker 4: team with Super Bowl aspirations. This is what we wanted.
13:22
Speaker 4: That's disingenuous at best. If they wanted that strategy, they
13:26
Speaker 4: would have employed that strategy three or four months ago
13:29
Speaker 4: and got it a significantly better deal. This is just
13:33
Speaker 4: life of being a Dallas Cowboys fan. And then you
13:36
Speaker 4: have to hear them sit up there on that podium
13:39
Speaker 4: and spend that BS and it's just it's nauseating. And
13:43
Speaker 4: I'm again, I know I sound emotional right now you
13:47
Speaker 4: start talking about it, but I really am immune to
13:50
Speaker 4: this stuff at this point. I expect this sort of
13:52
Speaker 4: thing from the Dallas Cowboys and I you know, the
13:58
Speaker 4: Packers are super contenders. Again, the Packers have won Super
14:02
Speaker 4: Bowl since the Cowboys were even in an NFC championship game.
14:05
Speaker 4: We're going on thirty years of this stuff. Man, it's
14:08
Speaker 4: it's exhausting if you follow this franchise.
14:13
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's it's it's remarkable to see from Afar and Tom.
14:17
Speaker 1: I wonder if you could speak to this because one
14:18
Speaker 1: other thing that seems to be a pattern of behavior
14:21
Speaker 1: by the Cowboys is they wait till the last minute
14:23
Speaker 1: to sign these guys, and it seems as if they
14:26
Speaker 1: end up having to spend more money because of that strategy.
14:29
Speaker 1: You know, Miles Garrett gets signed at the beginning of
14:31
Speaker 1: this offseason for forty million dollars a year, which obviously
14:34
Speaker 1: is a large sum of money. If they were first
14:37
Speaker 1: to market in going to Parsons at that point, is
14:40
Speaker 1: it reasonable that they could have gotten that deal, because
14:42
Speaker 1: it seems interesting in the football world different from them.
14:44
Speaker 1: Baseball just seems like whoever signs latest gets the most money.
14:48
Speaker 1: It's less about who was actually the best player, and
14:50
Speaker 1: so it seems like there's a way be first to market,
14:53
Speaker 1: not last to market. Why are they consistently last to
14:55
Speaker 1: market here on signing their players?
14:58
Speaker 3: Well, first of all, and then Micah ca and this
15:00
Speaker 3: is the way I think it went. I'm not so sure.
15:03
Speaker 3: Mike and his agent wanted to be first. So hey,
15:05
Speaker 3: let's let's let all these guys sign and then when
15:07
Speaker 3: they're all done, then we'll know where the ceiling is
15:09
Speaker 3: and then we'll go. So I'm not going to hold
15:11
Speaker 3: the Cowboys to to that. Now that the Dak Prescott
15:15
Speaker 3: cedde Lamb, that could be different. Now there's different philosophies
15:19
Speaker 3: on being first to market. So like Bill Pulling is
15:23
Speaker 3: a Hall of fame gm okay, Joe Banner really could
15:27
Speaker 3: be a Hall of fame gm okay. They both did
15:29
Speaker 3: it different ways, different philosophies. Both can work. Joe Banner
15:33
Speaker 3: would sign everybody early, okay, so you had a smaller
15:36
Speaker 3: body of work on the player. Now, with a Micah Parsons,
15:39
Speaker 3: you kind of know what he's going to be, but
15:40
Speaker 3: not every player is like that. So but your smaller
15:43
Speaker 3: body of work, you make a decision to put to
15:45
Speaker 3: invest money in the player, so you know there's some
15:49
Speaker 3: there's some misfactor there.
15:50
Speaker 2: Bill Pulling was different.
15:51
Speaker 3: He wanted a full body of work on the player
15:53
Speaker 3: before he decided to make a big investment. Some of
15:56
Speaker 3: that was you know, we were a cash to cap team,
15:58
Speaker 3: and if you put a big amount of money into
16:00
Speaker 3: a player and it doesn't pan out, boy, that's a
16:02
Speaker 3: lot less money we have to spend somewhere else. Now,
16:04
Speaker 3: if your team that can spend cash over cap, you
16:07
Speaker 3: can make some missus here or there and you can
16:08
Speaker 3: kind of buy your way out it for a little bit.
16:10
Speaker 3: But again, two different philosophies both can work. Dallas has
16:14
Speaker 3: been more the bill philosophy that they want a bigger
16:17
Speaker 3: body of work. Sometimes. I mean sometimes maybe the agent
16:21
Speaker 3: just doesn't want to get going early. So but obviously, yes,
16:24
Speaker 3: the earlier you can sign a player who's a known
16:26
Speaker 3: player for you, the better because it'll give you more flexibility.
16:30
Speaker 3: I mean, we just saw with the pass rushers where
16:32
Speaker 3: it started, where it ended. I mean, it goes by
16:34
Speaker 3: fast and almost every free agent we ever signed. You
16:38
Speaker 3: do the deal and you're kind of clenching your teeth. Boy,
16:40
Speaker 3: it seems like more than we really wanted to do.
16:42
Speaker 3: And less than twelve months later, you look at your
16:44
Speaker 3: own dealer like, oh, this is a good deal.
16:46
Speaker 2: Look at all the.
16:47
Speaker 3: Guys that already passed them. Boy, we got a great deal,
16:49
Speaker 3: great value. So yeah, doing the deals early. There's positive
16:53
Speaker 3: negatives to everything. Obviously, do a deal early and the
16:56
Speaker 3: player gets hurt. Okay, now you're not getting your return
16:59
Speaker 3: on it. You do it too good, a deal too
17:02
Speaker 3: early and the player wants to come back to the
17:03
Speaker 3: table a lot earlier, and you're losing all your value there.
17:06
Speaker 3: It doesn't mean you have to do a new deal
17:07
Speaker 3: with the player. But but you know, so Dallas has
17:10
Speaker 3: done it their way. But I think in this Micah one,
17:12
Speaker 3: I'm not so sure the agent didn't didn't say, Hey, look,
17:15
Speaker 3: my guy is an All Pro player, he's young, and
17:18
Speaker 3: we're gonna wait for these other guys to go and
17:19
Speaker 3: when they're done, then what we'll talk after that?
17:23
Speaker 1: Go ahead?
17:24
Speaker 4: Well, I was gonna say, uh, from all the things
17:27
Speaker 4: here in the media circles, Tom's exactly right on that.
17:32
Speaker 4: The one caveat there is that it was Micah that
17:36
Speaker 4: always wanted to be a Dallas cowboy and loved having
17:38
Speaker 4: the star on his helmet. And from the way some
17:41
Speaker 4: of the reports are, if they're accurate, they could have
17:44
Speaker 4: gotten Micah done a year and a half ago because
17:46
Speaker 4: Micah was chomping at the bit, and this is probably
17:49
Speaker 4: why Jerry was so comfortable just dealing with Micah and
17:52
Speaker 4: thought he got a deal done and he was like no, no, no, no, no,
17:54
Speaker 4: we don't get down like that, and and that's fine.
17:57
Speaker 4: The response should not be to say, I don't even
17:59
Speaker 4: know what what's his name's name is? And you know,
18:02
Speaker 4: it's like, there's a way to handle things that don't
18:05
Speaker 4: go your way, and Jerry just doesn't handle anything well
18:09
Speaker 4: that doesn't go his way, and then he makes it
18:11
Speaker 4: personal and then we get the situation that we get.
18:15
Speaker 4: I think the way Tom laid it out is exactly right.
18:17
Speaker 4: But ultimately, the agent works for the player, and if
18:20
Speaker 4: the player really wants to be somewhere, you can get
18:23
Speaker 4: something something done. I also like what Tom says. I'm
18:27
Speaker 4: a big believer in this, and I think this sizes
18:29
Speaker 4: back to the Cowboys. There are multiple ways to go
18:33
Speaker 4: about something and be successful. There's not just one way.
18:36
Speaker 4: And I love this all the time, Like when a
18:39
Speaker 4: team kind of emerges with a new trend and there
18:42
Speaker 4: was like, oh, well that's the way to win, and
18:43
Speaker 4: so much talk in the NBA, for example, has been
18:45
Speaker 4: about three point shooting, for example, and I would say, okay, well,
18:49
Speaker 4: now all the defenses are adjusting to three point shooting. So, man,
18:52
Speaker 4: that mid range shot is going to be open for
18:54
Speaker 4: teams if it becomes a high percentage shot if a
18:57
Speaker 4: guy knocks it down. You know, analytics are based on
19:00
Speaker 4: what's already happened. Those numbers can change as your strategies
19:04
Speaker 4: change over time, and then the numbers are going to change, right.
19:06
Speaker 4: There's going to be things that the game adapts and
19:09
Speaker 4: evolves as someone sets a new trend and then you
19:12
Speaker 4: counter that trend. The problem I have with how the
19:15
Speaker 4: Cowboys have done it. I think you can say their
19:18
Speaker 4: strategy is to draft and sign their own, and they
19:22
Speaker 4: do do that. And if you look at the guys
19:23
Speaker 4: the Cowboys signed earlier, it's usually guys that give them
19:26
Speaker 4: deals because they really want to be there. Like that's
19:29
Speaker 4: worked out well for the Cowboys, but all of their
19:31
Speaker 4: big time players do come down to the very end here.
19:35
Speaker 4: But the thing that I get frustrated with is there
19:38
Speaker 4: is not a definable philosophy that the Cowboys have. Even
19:43
Speaker 4: if that philosophy quote unquote evolves or changes, that's good,
19:46
Speaker 4: that's smart. You don't want to be stuck in one way,
19:49
Speaker 4: But man, they yank it all over the damn road
19:53
Speaker 4: and that's why. And maybe I'm reading too much into
19:57
Speaker 4: this series. It's Jerry Jones, the gambler, and everything is
20:00
Speaker 4: shoot from your hip and woo, I was lucky in Oil.
20:03
Speaker 4: I'm gonna get lucky again. And I just I know
20:06
Speaker 4: that from when you know, me and Ben spent a
20:08
Speaker 4: lot of time around you and JD and AJ and
20:11
Speaker 4: the guys and having conversation. You guys had a plan
20:16
Speaker 4: and you also had alternate plans for if your plan
20:20
Speaker 4: didn't work. You guys, whether it was gonna work or not,
20:23
Speaker 4: you had a philosophy and a strategy and you built
20:27
Speaker 4: that and you went for it. I'm so enamored with
20:31
Speaker 4: what Sam Presty has done in Oklahoma City and a
20:34
Speaker 4: small market because I kind of know a little bit
20:36
Speaker 4: about how he views things. It may not work, but
20:39
Speaker 4: it is a strategy and thought has gone into that.
20:42
Speaker 4: And I get so frustrated with the Cowboys because I
20:45
Speaker 4: think that Jerry doesn't allow them to have a consistent
20:50
Speaker 4: strategy that's well thought out. Everything is about the sizzle
20:54
Speaker 4: and the deal and all that stuff, and it's just
20:56
Speaker 4: not a way to have a winning team, as evidence
20:59
Speaker 4: in a league where everyone takes a turn going to
21:01
Speaker 4: the championship game. They can't seem to get in line.
21:04
Speaker 4: It's it's maddening.
21:07
Speaker 1: It's been referenced a few times on the show here,
21:09
Speaker 1: and I just want to say, in Major League Baseball,
21:12
Speaker 1: if you negotiate directly with a player, you're going to
21:14
Speaker 1: lose your job. Like so, it's fascinating to me that
21:17
Speaker 1: one of the undercurrents of this story is that Jerry
21:20
Speaker 1: not only was negotiating directly, but also seemingly was outraged
21:24
Speaker 1: and was not going to allow the agent to participate.
21:27
Speaker 1: Shifting gears for a second here, back to Jerry, I
21:29
Speaker 1: just don't real quickly.
21:31
Speaker 3: So just with so we don't have or we the
21:34
Speaker 3: NFL doesn't have that rule. I mean, the agent has
21:38
Speaker 3: to be certified. He can't negotiate with a non certified agent.
21:41
Speaker 3: But there's no rule you can't negotiate directly with the player.
21:44
Speaker 3: I've never done it. Well, we did it once because
21:46
Speaker 3: the player didn't have an agent. But yeah, they're not
21:49
Speaker 3: circumventing the CBA by talking directly to the player. But
21:52
Speaker 3: usually the player to say, look, you know, call my
21:54
Speaker 3: agent and look the especially in this contract, Mike is
21:58
Speaker 3: paying his agent a lot of money for guidance consultation
22:03
Speaker 3: on these contracts. His agent has done this hundreds thousands
22:06
Speaker 3: of times before. He does it for a living. The
22:08
Speaker 3: player doesn't do this for a living, so he should
22:12
Speaker 3: want to use an agent, and he was. But but yeah,
22:15
Speaker 3: there was Dallas in doing anything that was against the
22:17
Speaker 3: CBA by talking directly to the player.
22:20
Speaker 1: It's remarkable. I mean, in baseball, just fundamentally, for this
22:23
Speaker 1: very reason, you have to work with the representative because
22:26
Speaker 1: it's assumed that they have more knowledge in the space
22:28
Speaker 1: and will represent the player better than the player at
22:30
Speaker 1: ken himself. Not to rub a little lemon juice in
22:35
Speaker 1: the old wound here, but I'm going to read a
22:36
Speaker 1: few quotes from Jerry Jones that I love your reaction
22:40
Speaker 1: and quoting here. This was a move to get us
22:42
Speaker 1: successful in the playoffs. This was a move to be
22:45
Speaker 1: better on defense. Obviously we didn't think it was the
22:48
Speaker 1: best interest of our organization, not only the future, but
22:51
Speaker 1: right now this season as well. This gives us a
22:54
Speaker 1: chance to be a better team period. How do you
22:57
Speaker 1: think the average fan is responding to that?
23:00
Speaker 4: I think I think the average fan Jerry's one of
23:04
Speaker 4: those guys when you're around him. It's fun to be
23:07
Speaker 4: around him. But I think even the average fan is
23:09
Speaker 4: tired of his BS, right, and so these sorts of
23:12
Speaker 4: things they just ring hollow. And theoretically what he said
23:17
Speaker 4: is accurate, So then do it when you can get
23:20
Speaker 4: a much better deal. Three months ago. Nothing's changed. They
23:23
Speaker 4: haven't been able to stop the run the entire time.
23:25
Speaker 4: Micah Parsons was there racking up this incredible you know,
23:29
Speaker 4: pass rush rate and uh, you know, getting these sacks
23:33
Speaker 4: and you know you have to double sometimes triple team him.
23:35
Speaker 4: They've never been able to stop to run this entire time.
23:38
Speaker 4: So they knew this. So in theory, what Jerry's saying
23:42
Speaker 4: is accurate. It's just after the fact. BS, they would
23:45
Speaker 4: have aggressively addressed it months ago, and so it's like
23:50
Speaker 4: they got cornered into the deal, and this is how
23:52
Speaker 4: they spin it. And that's what I think drives all
23:55
Speaker 4: the fans crazy because we have this long track record
23:59
Speaker 4: of this sort of behavior. And again, man in the
24:03
Speaker 4: press conference yesterday, Jerry Jones told a story that he
24:07
Speaker 4: has told a hundred times about a contract dealing with
24:12
Speaker 4: Michael Irvin, in which he said something clever about the
24:15
Speaker 4: city of El Paso, and Michael threw up his hands.
24:18
Speaker 4: He's like, I can't deal with you, Jerry, You're the best,
24:21
Speaker 4: and then going over and signs the deal. So we're
24:23
Speaker 4: talking about something that happened in the mid nineties, and
24:26
Speaker 4: that that's what he's sitting up on the stage talking about.
24:30
Speaker 4: He's talking, he's referencing, Well, you know, I've done a
24:33
Speaker 4: million deals, and it's and it's it's maddening that we're
24:36
Speaker 4: still stuck in that time warp. And it's good to
24:42
Speaker 4: know what Tom said. I didn't realize that you could
24:44
Speaker 4: quote unquote negotiate with the player. But you know, it
24:48
Speaker 4: doesn't really matter because if the deal is not done, okay,
24:53
Speaker 4: how do we how do we get it done? If
24:56
Speaker 4: you want to be here and we want you here,
24:57
Speaker 4: how do we get this done? And the answer is
24:59
Speaker 4: to not pretend like you don't know the agent's name
25:01
Speaker 4: and go insult him on a Michael Irban podcast. That's
25:04
Speaker 4: not the way to get the deal done.
25:07
Speaker 1: Tom. One last question for you. I'm just curious from
25:10
Speaker 1: our general manager's perspective, it seems to me like these
25:14
Speaker 1: deals are extremely difficult to make period. But additionally, because
25:19
Speaker 1: you really there are three parties involved because there's a
25:21
Speaker 1: sign and trade effectively going on here, or a sign
25:23
Speaker 1: right after the trade, so it's the two teams and
25:27
Speaker 1: the player. So part of what the Packers are giving
25:30
Speaker 1: up in this deal is signing Micah to a very
25:33
Speaker 1: lucrative contract, but that contract has no value to the Cowboys. Similarly,
25:37
Speaker 1: when the Cowboys are getting draft picks back by definition
25:41
Speaker 1: by giving them Micah Parsons, they're devaluing those draft picks
25:44
Speaker 1: because now they should be better. So there's some kind
25:47
Speaker 1: of wonkiness in my opinion of like how you value
25:49
Speaker 1: these things, which I imagine is why these are really tough
25:52
Speaker 1: deals to make, because when the Green Bay Packers are saying, hey, listen,
25:56
Speaker 1: part of what we're giving up here is this exceptionally
25:59
Speaker 1: large contract, and the Cowboys say, well, that doesn't do
26:01
Speaker 1: us any good and we're still looking for value elsewhere,
26:03
Speaker 1: like how much does the does those things kind of
26:05
Speaker 1: complicate these types of.
26:07
Speaker 3: Deals, Well, I wouldn't want to hear the other team
26:09
Speaker 3: complaining because you know they're part of this trade and
26:12
Speaker 3: they're they're trading for an all pro players, So you
26:15
Speaker 3: have to give up something, and you better give up
26:17
Speaker 3: a lot. But typically when there's draft picks involved, or
26:21
Speaker 3: draft picks and players for the trade involved plus a contract,
26:24
Speaker 3: you always want to hammer out the compensation as far
26:27
Speaker 3: as what the trade parameters are going to be first.
26:29
Speaker 3: I would never want to let the other team start
26:31
Speaker 3: negotiating with the player first. They get that done, and
26:34
Speaker 3: then now you start to lose some leverage because now
26:36
Speaker 3: the player knows, hey, look, I got this deal done
26:38
Speaker 3: with Green Bay for whatever. It's going to be forty
26:40
Speaker 3: five million a year. We got to make this deal,
26:43
Speaker 3: and they start losing a little bit of leverage. So
26:45
Speaker 3: it was always, hey, let's get the parameters done first,
26:47
Speaker 3: and we nail those down, okay, and have a verbal
26:50
Speaker 3: agreement on that.
26:51
Speaker 2: Now you can talk to the agent.
26:54
Speaker 3: But you know, this is a it's a difficult deal
26:56
Speaker 3: to do just because the contract is a contract. But
27:00
Speaker 3: what's the right compensation. Going back to the Cowboys and
27:03
Speaker 3: two first round draft picks and a and a proven player,
27:07
Speaker 3: it sounds good, you know those two draft picks. You know,
27:12
Speaker 3: best case scenario, you get you know, a starter, maybe
27:15
Speaker 3: two starters, maybe you get a pro bowler, and you
27:18
Speaker 3: get them for four years at below market prices. But
27:21
Speaker 3: The reality of it is, the draft is it's a
27:24
Speaker 3: little bit like lottery.
27:25
Speaker 2: Take us.
27:25
Speaker 3: Now, the higher you pick that you have a better chance.
27:27
Speaker 3: But fifty five percent of players in the first round
27:31
Speaker 3: sign a second contract with that club. Okay, very few
27:35
Speaker 3: actually become All pros. So you're getting two first round
27:38
Speaker 3: draft picks, but I'll tell you you'll hit on one.
27:41
Speaker 3: And the Cowboys have drafted pretty well, so they have
27:43
Speaker 3: a chance to get on both. Okay, but is one
27:46
Speaker 3: of them going to be at a premier position and
27:48
Speaker 3: an All Pro player?
27:49
Speaker 2: Well, that's hard to say.
27:52
Speaker 3: So you look at some of the trades in the
27:53
Speaker 3: past of teams that decide, all right, we don't want
27:56
Speaker 3: to pay this player, but we'll just draft as replacement. Well,
27:59
Speaker 3: Tennessee's send Aj Brown to Philly, Okay, we'll just draft
28:02
Speaker 3: Trailing Burks as his replacement in the first round. Didn't
28:06
Speaker 3: work Okay, San Francisco is same thing with the Forrest Buckner.
28:10
Speaker 3: We're gonna pay some other players, will trade him to
28:12
Speaker 3: the Colts, and we'll draft his replacement. Javon Kinlaw didn't
28:15
Speaker 3: work out, So you can't just guarantee that, Hey, we're
28:18
Speaker 3: trading parsons, but we now we'll have two Pro Bowl
28:21
Speaker 3: players to take his place. Maybe that happens, but the
28:24
Speaker 3: odds say that's that's gonna be a little bit low. So,
28:28
Speaker 3: like Skin said earlier, if this was done in March
28:32
Speaker 3: and April, you just have more teams competing, more teams
28:35
Speaker 3: are budget at that point, cash and cap wise to
28:39
Speaker 3: do a deal, and then that kind of will increase
28:41
Speaker 3: your compensation back because you'd have a lot of teams
28:43
Speaker 3: competing for Micha Parsons. It wouldn't be just one. But
28:46
Speaker 3: you do it now, it's just less people involved. When
28:49
Speaker 3: there's less people involved, you can't get you lose some leverage,
28:51
Speaker 3: you don't have as much coming back.
28:53
Speaker 1: Yeah, I couldn't agree with you more, Tom. I always
28:55
Speaker 1: felt like you look at these deals and is is
28:58
Speaker 1: this the best deal you can make or is the
29:00
Speaker 1: best deal you can make right now? Or with some
29:02
Speaker 1: other qualifiers. And when you're trading elite players, you never
29:06
Speaker 1: want there to be a qualifier. You never want there
29:08
Speaker 1: to be a drag on the value of the trade.
29:10
Speaker 1: And you guys know more about the NFL in this
29:12
Speaker 1: market than I do, but it just feels like there
29:14
Speaker 1: was a drag here. Skin. My last question for you.
29:17
Speaker 1: You kind of alluded to this earlier and for the
29:19
Speaker 1: listeners to know Skin has like a PhD in the NBA,
29:23
Speaker 1: So I'm going to link it back in here is
29:25
Speaker 1: what is the state of the Dallas Fort Worth fan
29:28
Speaker 1: base right now? Like, on the positive side, the Rangers
29:30
Speaker 1: win the World Series in twenty twenty three, you got
29:32
Speaker 1: Cooper Flag in the first round, but you've also lost
29:35
Speaker 1: Micah Parsons and Luka Doncic. It seems like there's a
29:38
Speaker 1: lot of highs and lows. There's a lot of heartbreak
29:40
Speaker 1: mixed in there. When the dust settles, how are they feeling?
29:44
Speaker 4: I think right now the fan base is completely battered.
29:47
Speaker 4: And I think, you know, the NFL is so crazy
29:50
Speaker 4: because so much of it's going to come down to
29:52
Speaker 4: injuries and what players get injured. I mean, I think
29:55
Speaker 4: you know, with relatively good health, the Cowboys are going
29:59
Speaker 4: to be in an eight or nine win team, and
30:01
Speaker 4: with some bad health then you're looking at a five
30:03
Speaker 4: or six win team, and that's not going to make
30:05
Speaker 4: anybody in the fan base feel good. I think. I actually,
30:11
Speaker 4: if you look at trading Luca and how lucky they
30:14
Speaker 4: got with Cooper Flag, I actually really like the Mavericks
30:19
Speaker 4: team if Kyrie Irving is healthy and Kyrie Irving ain't healthy,
30:23
Speaker 4: so they don't have enough shooting and they don't have
30:25
Speaker 4: enough playmaking. But they have a chance to be a
30:28
Speaker 4: top three defensive team in the league. I wholeheartedly believe that.
30:31
Speaker 4: I know the way Jason Kid coaches, and if he's
30:34
Speaker 4: willing to put Anthony Davis and Derek Lively the second
30:37
Speaker 4: and PJ. Washington Junior, who's their best primter defender, and
30:40
Speaker 4: also six seven with long arms out there with Cooper Flag,
30:44
Speaker 4: that is a dominant defensive team. But they don't have
30:47
Speaker 4: enough shooting and they don't have enough playmaking for the
30:50
Speaker 4: modern NBA. So I think the fan base is not
30:54
Speaker 4: going to get to feel that because Kyrie's not coming
30:58
Speaker 4: back until February, your March, and when he does come back,
31:02
Speaker 4: maybe he's seventy five percent or eighty percent. I really
31:05
Speaker 4: think if their health turns around, they got a chance
31:08
Speaker 4: to be incredible next season, right But when you've been
31:12
Speaker 4: watching Luka Doncic drag you to the finals, for a fan,
31:17
Speaker 4: that's not going to feel good for them. The franchise
31:22
Speaker 4: was saved with the Cooper Flag pick. I mean, I
31:26
Speaker 4: just I was watching that lottery and man, because we
31:29
Speaker 4: had dealt with so much. I mean, the Kyrie Irving
31:32
Speaker 4: injury was devastating. You guys, know, when you have a
31:35
Speaker 4: star and he gets hurt, it's devastating. And Kyrie literally
31:40
Speaker 4: just put the team on his back and was doing
31:43
Speaker 4: amazing things. And there's all this baggage that came with
31:46
Speaker 4: Kyrie before he arrived. And let me just tell you, guys,
31:50
Speaker 4: he has been wonderful. And I was from being from afar,
31:54
Speaker 4: not knowing him personally, I was scared because of what
31:58
Speaker 4: you read and what you see, I have not seen
32:01
Speaker 4: any of that. He's been amazing to work with. He's
32:04
Speaker 4: been a leader.
32:05
Speaker 2: You know.
32:05
Speaker 4: I think the Mavericks got the benefit of getting him
32:07
Speaker 4: after he went through all of that hell and was
32:10
Speaker 4: drugged through the media, mud and all that stuff in
32:13
Speaker 4: Boston and Brooklyn. And I'm not absolving him of any
32:16
Speaker 4: of his own doing, but it seems like he had
32:19
Speaker 4: emerged from that in a wonderful place and then he
32:21
Speaker 4: gets a pretty catastrophic injury. Right. And so if you
32:25
Speaker 4: watched one half of Anthony Davis and Kyrie Irving together
32:28
Speaker 4: when they played the Rockets, they looked like an elite team,
32:31
Speaker 4: and then Anthony Davis gets hurt. So it's a long
32:35
Speaker 4: way of saying that this fan base has been drugged
32:37
Speaker 4: through the mud, the emotional mud, and I don't know
32:40
Speaker 4: that they're gonna get the immediate dividends to pull him
32:44
Speaker 4: out of it. I think that the fall and the
32:48
Speaker 4: in January February time is going to be a lot
32:51
Speaker 4: of hits to him, and it's gonna be the Cowboys
32:55
Speaker 4: and the Mavericks happening at the same time. And who
32:57
Speaker 4: knows what happens with the Rangers. Man, they got a
32:59
Speaker 4: lot of injuries, and boy, the Bats didn't come to
33:03
Speaker 4: get So it feels like a dark time for the
33:05
Speaker 4: fan base who can never see the you know, past
33:09
Speaker 4: the immediate problems. I think that things will turn around
33:13
Speaker 4: with relative health, but it's going to be five or
33:16
Speaker 4: six months down the road before anybody sees that, Hey.
33:19
Speaker 2: Coop Cooper flag this year.
33:21
Speaker 3: Okay, arch Manning next year, and we'll forget all about this,
33:25
Speaker 3: that this all happened.
33:27
Speaker 4: I will be fine, Tom, Thank you for promising me
33:30
Speaker 4: that I heard it right here on this podcast. Guaranteed
33:33
Speaker 4: me that's gonna happen. But Yeah, that would be that
33:37
Speaker 4: would be nice. And then you have this dragantic contract
33:40
Speaker 4: with Dak and everyone yelling that they want the rookie
33:42
Speaker 4: to play.
33:44
Speaker 3: Always got to look at the balance side.
33:47
Speaker 1: I think you've inspired us to do a show on
33:49
Speaker 1: all the conspiracy theories around the draft lottery and frozen
33:53
Speaker 1: enflopes and sticky sticky ping pong balls, because no franchise
33:57
Speaker 1: needed the number one pick more than the Dallas man Well,
34:00
Speaker 1: I want to thank you, guys, both the tremendous wisdom
34:03
Speaker 1: of the general manager here from Tom, and the exceptional
34:07
Speaker 1: passion and the knowledge of the fan base from you Skin.
34:10
Speaker 1: Thank you guys for joining us. Please join me host
34:15
Speaker 1: bad Levine, Ryan McDonough and other general managers every week
34:19
Speaker 1: for Roster Syringes on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get
34:23
Speaker 1: your podcasts.
34:24
Speaker 4: Welcome