40s and Free Agents: Micah Parsons Traded to the Packers Reaction!

00:00:03
Speaker 1: Welcome to a special breaking news episode of Forties and Free Agents. I am here Greg Rosenthal with my friend Daniel Jeremiah just minutes after one of the biggest trades in NFL history. We can call it that, Micah Parsons is going to the Green Bay Packers in exchange for two first round picks and veteran Kenny Clark. On top of that, he signed a four year, one hundred and eighty eight million dollar contract with one hundred and thirty six million dollars guaranteed. It is good to be Micah Parsons, and it is good to be Daniel Jeremiah who gets to do a breaking news podcast with yours. Truly, this is gonna be fun. Like what was your first reaction? Where were you when you saw this?

00:00:47
Speaker 2: Yeah, I was I just got back from lunch and I was in the family room and I got on my phone. This is what's This is the scale I we'll use for how big of a story it is. It was an at wrap sheet tweet and I did a triple It was a triple check of is this am I getting fooled here? I don't want to retweet this if this is not authentic and it was like, oh, yeah, this, this really happened. So that was my first reaction. My second reaction was I was on an interview yesterday and was asked about this, and I said, you know, I kind of perked up a little bit when they asked Brian gudakinst at the press conference yesterday about it. I speak, I'm fluent in GM. I speak fluent GM. I know exactly how they handle and answer every single question, and it's all right out of a playbook. And anytime anybody ever asked you about a player on another team or opportunity or potential trade, the stock GM answer you get every single time is you know what, I'm not gonna I'm not gonna comment on any other players, you know, worried about the guys we have in our room. Blah blah blah blah blah. That's standard stock answer. You never give it any any light whatsoever. And he said, and he's quoted even I think before this what we saw yesterday, which was, hey, if we have an opportunity, we're willing to you know, we're willing to part with picks and we're willing to live. And I'm like, that is far from what the normal answer is in that situation, my ears perked up a little bit.

00:02:07
Speaker 1: Well, they were right to perk up, because Ian Rappaport, who Yeah put the news out, said that the terms of the deal I believe between Parsons and the Packers were done two days ago, and I think they were figuring out the compensation in the meantime. I ultimately think it's bad business to trade a player that I believe is the best pure pass rusher of the last twenty years to enter the league.

00:02:39
Speaker 3: You could make an argument for.

00:02:41
Speaker 1: Von Miller or Miles Garrett, and that's fine, but just in terms of came into the league and was immediately a complete difference maker as a pass rusher. He finished second in Defensive Player of the Year, not Rookie the Year Player of the Year as a rookie and has maintained that high level for three seasons. I would say last season was a little bit of a step back. Room was at one hundred percent healthy. I think it is bad business not to just get the deal done with Micah Parsons and avoid all that, because if you think about it, DJ the Packers were not only willing to give him that contract, he was worth enough to give him that contract and two first round picks. So I think that says something about the type of player that he is. And I think it's bad business for the Cowboys. But for the Packers, we've been asking for them to add a little more juice. This.

00:03:29
Speaker 3: This is a little more juice. This is a lot more juice.

00:03:31
Speaker 2: There's so many different angles to hit this on. So I guess I'll try and narrow my thoughts. So let's do Packers and then we'll get the Cowboys. So I'll start on the Packers side of things. I always talk to guys in the personnel departments and leadership when we get to the offseason. You know, whether it's at All Star games, combine phone calls before the draft, you know what are your team needs, what are you looking for? You know, you know kind of where you are in your process. And the thing I got from the Packers was we love all the talent we have on defense. We have a lot of young guys. We have We've invested a lot of high picks in front seven players. We think we've got some really really good football players. We don't know that we have that blue level player, which we call like a blue chip guy who's you know, that's the highest of the high one of somebody who's a top three to five player at their position in the league. They felt like that a lot of guys kind of in that their top we're top ten to fifteen players at their position. We don't have a top three to five guy at his position, and we don't have a player that we felt if we go into a big game that the opponent is circling and going, we have to game plan and scheme around this player. So we really want to get an impact player. We really want a blue level player. And their thing to me was our hope is that some of our existing guys can maybe evolve into that and be those guys, but we have to be real with ourselves that they're not there at this point in time. So this clearly checks that box. That's the first thing. The second thing is I'm a huge believer in understanding your windows and understanding what phase are you in right now?

00:05:01
Speaker 1: Is this a.

00:05:03
Speaker 2: Hey, we're trying to get from okay to good phase, Like let's be a little bit smart and savvy with our moves. Is this a little bit of a tear down? Hey, we got to go down to go back up, or is this We're this close, Greg, and let's be bold and let's be aggressive and let's go for it. And I feel like with Jordan Love where he is in his ascension with a system and coaching staff offensive with it's in place. They're looking at all these young defensive players and they said it's go time. And I love that because I think that's the proper I think that was a proper identification of where their team is.

00:05:34
Speaker 3: I think that's absolutely right.

00:05:36
Speaker 1: And a peek behind the curtain for the listeners wondering why are we doing the breaking news episode.

00:05:40
Speaker 3: Look, we taped a couple episodes earlier.

00:05:42
Speaker 1: Today you're going to hear forties of free agents where we draft who could be the Super Bowl champion. Well that was blown up, so we had to get together to fix that. Well we might as well just do the breaking news. And one of the points I thought that you made a good point about the Packers when you saw them spend money on Aaron Banks an interior alignment, like that was a move that teams make when they think they're really close. But this is like another level to the Aaron Banks move, and I love it. I do love it because now Rashan Gary is their second. Like they still have talented players up front, but now Rashan Gary is in a more supplementary role. Lucas van Ness who they like, and he can be the number three guy there like it helps out the guys on the interior and DeVante Wyatt.

00:06:23
Speaker 3: So there's a lot of people that are helped out by this trade.

00:06:25
Speaker 2: All right, Can I give Eric homework?

00:06:26
Speaker 3: By the way, that's our producer.

00:06:28
Speaker 2: Yes, I'm a lot of your producer Eric homework. Just by the time we end the time we end this little conversation, can we get Micah Parsons career numbers against the Philadelphia Eagles. I'd be curious about that because this also does feel like you went out and got Aaron Banks to block Jalen Carter, a team that you have to get through to get to a Super Bowl out of the NFC. Now you go out and get Micah Parsons, who's going to be extremely familiar with with Philly and obviously he's a great player. An elite player at elite position is going to work against any team. But as you're trying to get over the hump, and I think that everybody that's in the NFC clearly has the Philadelphia Eagles, you know, in their sights, that's who you're trying to That's who you got to get by. It's who you got to beat. So I absolutely love it from the Green Bay side of things in terms of the picks. Two first round picks Kenny Clark, which I was a little surprised, the Cowboys and we'll get to them that they didn't want an edge guy, you know, because you're losing one, bring one in, but they do have some depth there. You're going to have him and Odiga Zua. Again, we'll get to the Cowboys. But I love it from the Packers' standpoint. To me, it's I'm always going to be optimistic on picks that they're going to be late picks. Everybody's optimistic about how the team they have and how this player is going to come in and give them a late pick. Whereas the Cowboys side of things, I like lottery tickets on bad teams. I don't like the lottery tickets on really really good teams. I'd almost rather know what I'm getting In terms of where the picks are.

00:07:49
Speaker 1: Yeah, and you know, I'll do respect to the players I'm mentioning, but like, think of the last first round picks, late first round picks for the Packers. Lucas van Ness is one of them, qua Walker is one of them. DeVante Whyett is one of them. Solid players. But you're not drafting at the top of the first round, and you're not planning to be drafting at the top of the first round when you trade for Micah Parsons, So.

00:08:14
Speaker 2: You're not fine Michah Parsons in the late twenties, I can tell you right.

00:08:17
Speaker 1: Even the fact he slipped as far as he did, good job by Dallas, but ultimately you're giving up some of that. There are historical precedents. I mean, of course you think of just like Reggie White coming to the Packers, but that's a different situation. But in terms of a trade, the terms are not crazy different to the Khalil Mack trade to the Bears back in the day where the Raiders got to firsts Now they did send a second back and they got a third. So it's a little more complicated with Kenny Clark involved, but essentially to first was part of it. I think Parsons, like I said, is another level of player which is hard to say than Khalil Mack, but I do think he's ultimately a first ballot Hall of Fame type of player that you need to get the most out of. And when we've been going through all this preseason talk, I haven't been that that high on the Packers because my big thing was I couldn't quite get there imagining this defense run by Jeff Haffley, who I think did a goo job last year, But I couldn't quite imagine this defense getting through an entire conference worth of playoff games before and now, like it's it's easier to see the vision.

00:09:24
Speaker 2: How about the speed? Just just look at three guys. Look at Micah Parsons, Edrin Cooper, Koy Walker, Like, first of all, Rashan Gary, if I have to go back through, I think he ran in the four high, four fives coming out like he's stupid athletic. Devonte Wyatt ran incredibly fast as someone at three hundred pounds, like they might have the fastest front seven in the NFL. Now throwing Micah Parsons into that mix. And by the way, Eric did his homework Parsons and how many games against the Eagles seven games against the Eagles five sacks, eight quarterback hits, six tackles for loss. So the team that you got to go through, he's got a pretty decent, decent track record against those guys.

00:10:04
Speaker 3: It's wild.

00:10:04
Speaker 1: And the crazy thing is like, that's not really out of the ordinary for his normal numbers, and yet I guess his back injury is fine. The second opinion on the back that was reported a day ago, it checked out, it's gonna be okay, and wow that Week one game against the Detroit Lions, and really, this whole Packers season, not that they weren't going to be in primetime already, but they are just box office. Let's get to the Cowboys side of things. If you're a Cowboys fan, it's really disappointing. This Netflix documentary is out and you think about the glory days and they spend a little time at the end of the documentary DJs, you know, looking at why they haven't been able to get back to the super Bowl and the mistakes that they've made running the team, And I think this just gives the impression of a team that doesn't think ahead enough, like they could have been like the Eagles, DJ and sign Michael Parsons to an appropriate contract a year ago, which would already look like a bargain because TJ. Watt and Miles Garrett would have gone past it, but they just chose not to do that and get into this situation and then it got really personal and all those reports in. Jordan Rodriga on NFL Daily talked about it too after she went to Cowboys camp, of that this felt a little different than most holdouts because it felt like it got personally. That's bad management, I think when you have a player as talented as Michael Parsons.

00:11:28
Speaker 2: Yeah, but I will also I've mentioned this other shows before, and that going out to training camp last year when they had the three deals that needed to get done, and when you talk to people around the team there and some on the coaching side that you'd talk to as well as some people just around the team, I got very consistent feedback which was, oh, CD Ceede, LAMB will get done. Like that, that contract will get done, Dak, that's Deck's contract will get done. That's going to happen. Micah, I don't know. I don't know about Micah. I don't know. There's some people that aren't quite comfortable with him here. I wouldn't say that's a slam dunk that that deal gets done. That was going back in the past, So that always kind of stuck with me that like they, I don't know that they were ever comfortable, you know, putting that investment in him, and I obviously has nothing to do with the player on the field, because what you've seen on the field easily that's an easy decision. Age production, you know, how his skill set should continue to age should be fine. To me, I don't know how you could look at this any other way than to say they weren't comfortable with Micah Parsons, the person making that investment. There's no other way to explain it. When you have a premier position, a premier talent, who's young, who's productive, who's literally made for today's football with what he can do in his skill set, to not pay that guy, to me has nothing to do with anything football related. That is to me again, I'm reading into it. I don't know how you read into it any other way. That has to be they weren't comfortable with Micah Parsons a person in order to do that.

00:12:58
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm so glad you you bring that up, and it's a great point. I really think about the DeMarcus Lawrence Micah Parsons like Twitter back and forth, which sounds stupid, like it's just the stupid thing and players, you know, they they not everyone has to get along.

00:13:15
Speaker 3: Okay, I get it.

00:13:16
Speaker 1: But DeMarcus Lawrence in that interaction, I think gave voice to some of the things you read from unnamed sources about the Cowboys team and the locker room makeup that maybe everyone wasn't exactly on the same page, and if you read a lot of it, it wasn't hard to read between the lines that Micah, in his maturity, maybe wasn't like everyone didn't love Micah in that locker room. And for DeMarcus Lawrence, who to me is kind of a great example of a great cowboy first of all, but a great pro that everyone lauds how he approaches the game, specifically, that he was the person that was kind of shading Michaeh. Parsons public for how he goes about things. That was telling to me because I think Marcus Lawrence is a guy who league wide and especially in the Cowboys building, has a ton of respect for how he approaches things, and so you're absolutely right that that plays into it and the Packers are going to have to figure out that part of the equation, and maybe that'll be a challenge long term, but I don't think it's going to be in twenty twenty five because he's going to be ready to rip off the faces of all of his opponents, including the Packers on September twenty eighth.

00:14:28
Speaker 3: That's a good one to have on the schedule.

00:14:30
Speaker 2: Can I can I give you one other comparison, because you mentioned the Khalil Mack one and I'm trying and I haven't seen all the reaction. I've just seen the immediate reaction as we you know, we jumped on to record this, but the immediate reaction was pretty harsh on the Cowboys, as you would imagine, you know, for not getting a deal done and signing the contract instead moving on from a talented player like this. But I do remember I remember being in a hotel. I don't remember if it was the Senior Bowl or whatever when the when the Stafford trade got done, and the immediate reaction was Detroit is just they're just giving up. They've you know, they have this talented quarterback, Matthew Stafford, viewed at the time as a top five, top seven quarterback, you know, as talented as anyone, and they're shipping them off and all they're getting is Jared Goff and some draft picks. Like they don't you know, the Detroit Lions are going to suck for the next decade. They clearly don't care about winning. In fact, we look at it now and Detroit set themselves up by making good selections there. Obviously, Jared Goff hitting at the quarterback position set themselves up for a decade run. So I don't want to shovel dirt on the Cowboys yet in terms of what this can look like for them long term. But I do think in speaking of the of the Packers window and recognizing they're in it and going for it, I don't know how you read into this anything other than the Cowboys feel like they're not good enough, this version is not good enough to take down the Eagles, and that they have to try and put some eggs in the basket going forward.

00:15:51
Speaker 1: Wow, yeah, I think, how do you? I think it's more of an ego thing, and by that I mean they the ego of this battle, which got personal with Michael Parsons that they didn't like them enough. And they didn't need them, and they didn't like how this negotiation went. And then the ego of we think we can do it both ways. We think we can win this year and trade away Michael Parsons because we've got four good addressers. If there is one team that could survive losing Michael Parsons just at that position, it's the Cowboys.

00:16:22
Speaker 3: So it's a review.

00:16:23
Speaker 1: I mean, they're not nearly the same now, but you got Ezaaku your guy the first rounder, like you got Dante Fowler, who's probably gonna start for this team. It was a pretty good pass rush for hire. He's been with the Cowboys before, with the Commanders last year. You have Sam Williams, who tour his ACL a couple of years ago, but it looked really good in training camp. He looked good a couple of years ago before trading parrying his ACL, a young player. And you have Marshawn Niland, who's more of a run stopper. So it's like it's a strong position. And I guess that's why they went for Kenny Clark because they are very thin in the defensive interior. But Kenny Clark's a declining player who didn't look right, last year, the Packers I thought were really counting on him to rebound, but he's an aging player and it's hard to count on a guy like that the rebound, so that that is a curious part of the deal.

00:17:10
Speaker 2: Yeah, I was just pulling up some numbers from last year. So for the Packer's side of it, Rashan Gary led them with seven and a half sacks, So you're you're adding Micah Parsons just gonna more than likely double what you had last year. You take Micah Parsons off the Cowboys, their leading soccer last year would have been at five and a half sacks. So yeah, they've got some talent there. Something that those guys were.

00:17:35
Speaker 3: Those three guys, none of them were there, So.

00:17:37
Speaker 2: I get it. I get those guys weren't all on campus, but in terms of just in recent in Dallas Cowboy uniforms with the star on their helmet, that's not you know, that's going to be difficult to replace that production, even though you've got some guys there.

00:17:50
Speaker 1: Well you know who didn't have a single sack. And I believe a quarterback hit through like the first six games of last season was Kenny Clark. I think he went about eight gamest a sack. It was something like six to eight without a quarterback hit. And yeah he was hurt. He was playing through an injury. But they're they're gonna need him to be better. I gotta say though, because if you're listening to the forties in free agent, you might have gotten it on the NFL Daily Feed. You might have moved the sticks or our own feed, and we just put up in the daily feed. This over underdraft they did with Nick Wright and Cowboys over seven and a half was one of my picks.

00:18:25
Speaker 3: It was like my sixth pick.

00:18:26
Speaker 2: Or something like that.

00:18:27
Speaker 1: I still think they're going to go over I really do. I think offensively that they have enough to be a winning football team. And there's the defense is now on a razor's edge. I get it, but I do think there's some upside to that defense. So all you would say to Cowboys fans is I actually think they can be competitive this year. You do get a couple first round picks. They like the Lions you mentioned in that trade, and the Rams for that matter, have been pretty good at drafting, at least at the top of the draft, even if it's a late first round pick that that's a feather in their cap. It's I'm just trying to, you know, think of the poor, downtrodden Cowboys fans in our lives.

00:19:07
Speaker 3: You know, it is.

00:19:08
Speaker 2: Weird to have grown up a child of the nineties. You know, Uh, that was kind of a I was born in seventy seven, so that's I mean, that's kind of like prime like into football age for me as the big, bad, bold Cowboys and you know, reeling in Charles Haley and going out and getting Dion Sanders and acquiring Joey Galloway. Like they've always been on one side of this deal, and it's like, I don't even know who you are anymore, Like you guys are on the on the selling side of this stuff. So it is what it is. It'll be it'll be fascinating to watch these two teams. But in kind of wrapping this thing up, Greg, I was looking at it. Maybe the only I think you could say, and I've talked a lot about the Eagles here, the Eagles and the Packers, maybe that those are the two fastest front sevens in football right now, like the most athletic, like young just big time, big time speed and inside that division with the Green Bay Packers. Think about Detroit Detroit with Gibbs and Williams, Like how explosive and dynamic they are. Laporta who can really run, and like, all of a sudden, now the Packers, they've got some fastballs at the you know, the front, first and second level of their defense. It's going to be fun to watch them. Man.

00:20:17
Speaker 1: Yeah, the fact that they have Edrian Cooper back there and he's really good if kway Walker, like, if nothing else, he has a fireball and he will be you're talking about team speed.

00:20:28
Speaker 3: You're right.

00:20:28
Speaker 1: I don't think there there are any teams that are more explosive in the front seven. I think the Vikings are very interesting and tough to prepare for, but they don't have the juice and the Texans they don't quite have the guys.

00:20:40
Speaker 3: On the interior in terms of their defensive line. And man, the Packers did it.

00:20:44
Speaker 1: I you know one thing I love about this too is Ted Thompson and Gouda Kuntz. You're right, like it's a it's just consistently hitting those singles, hitting those doubles. We're not going to spend too much in free agency, although they have started to so we're not.

00:20:58
Speaker 2: Going to draft a receiver in the front everybody want. We're not. It's like that should have been our that should have been our alarm clock. They're spending money in free agency. They're announcing to the world that they're taking a receiver in the in the drafts. In Green Bay, the whole town goes nuts. I mean, this is a new Packers.

00:21:14
Speaker 3: They they have.

00:21:15
Speaker 1: Yeah, they're they're replacing the Cowboys as an America's team.

00:21:19
Speaker 4: It would it would be fun to see, you know, oh, oh, you know it's a sidebar that I just thought of. I don't know if I told you this, but I was at UH. I went on a little one day getaway with the wife and we went up to the UH, up to the Ritz Carlton and Laguna Degel for one night. And we're staying there and I go out on the balcony and I see just a bunch of NFL looking players walking around.

00:21:42
Speaker 2: I'm like, what is going on here? Like? And then I see, oh, they're all dressed up nice, like must be a wedding. Uh, And so I all then all of a sudden, I see walking down from the wedding, I see a sign and I go, what is it? I can't quite make it out. And then I see David Mulgeta, the agent, walk right by and he looks up at me on the balcony. I'm only on the second floor, so you can could have seen me. He goes, what are you doing here? And I go, I'm just here like a little getaway with my wife. What's going on? So? Oh, it's Jordan Love's wedding. So now I'm putting the wheels in motion. David Mulgetta, Micah Parson's agent, was at Jordan Love's wedding. Lafleur was there the whole darn near Packers team wo. So my question is did I see the beginning of the makings of the this whole thing coming together at Jordan Love's wedding at the Ritz Carlton and Lagoon and a gel. Now my mind is like exploding as I'm figuring this out in real time.

00:22:31
Speaker 3: You did it.

00:22:31
Speaker 1: You don't need to go to Reddit and find the conspiracy theorists who, by the way, we're we're right on about this trade. You've got Daniel Jeremiah months ahead in actual real life. That's that's pretty bizarre quality reporting. And not too different from how that Dared Goff and Matthew Stafford. You know, trade all happened when John McVay and Stafford, they just happened to be vacationing at the same hotel in Mexico. Oh man, that is awesome. I'm glad the time worked out for us to get this in before the holiday weekend and before you hear back from us in the Forties and Free Agent Feed. So we're going to be playing a couple episodes Monday and Tuesday where we draft the most likely Super Bowl champions and I think the Packers have to move on.

00:23:19
Speaker 2: I got a value pick there.

00:23:20
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think they're They're looking good.

00:23:22
Speaker 1: All right, appreciate you, DJ, and yes, we'll be back in the feed in just a couple of days. Micah Parsons, I mean with the photoshop, he looks good in a pass.

00:23:34
Speaker 2: How about a bonus Forties and Free Agents that America. Good for you. You got a yellow bonus