August 29, 2025 • 34 mins
Tom Telesco joins Thad to highlight a special episode centered around the big NFL news of the Micah Parson's trade from Dallas to Green Bay. The GMs are joined by Dallas radio personality Jeff "Skin" Wade to not only discuss the trade and to also gauge the reaction of the Dallas fan base to the explosive news.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to a special episode of Rosters to Rings where
we break down the incredibly impactful trade between the Green
Bay Packers and the Dallas Cowboys. Micah Parsons heads to
Green Bay, Kenny Clark and two first round picks come
back to Dallas. Let's discuss it here on Rosters to Rings.
(00:25):
Alongside Tom toe LESCo, I am Thad Levine. We are
ecstatic to be joined by Jeff skin Wade of the
famous Ben and Skin Show. In addition to being an
accomplished media mogul and a well above average basketball player,
Skin represents the heartbeat of the Dallas Fort Worth Metroplex
fan base. No one is more knowledge of and passion
for sports and greater Dallas than does Skin. But I
(00:47):
want to start the conversation here with Tom Bombshell dropped
yesterday in the NFL. Micah Parsons traded by the Dallas
Cowboys to the Packers for Kenny Clark and two first
round picks. Give our listeners a a general manager's view
of this deal? What what does the value as you
assess it?
Speaker 2 (01:04):
Well?
Speaker 3 (01:05):
First of mean where to start? I mean, I just
I just finished three hours on NFL Radio and all
we talked about was the trade, how it affects Doles,
how it to affects Green Bay, what went into it.
Speaker 2 (01:15):
And this has been a huge story, and.
Speaker 3 (01:17):
It's this one's so unique because there's so much different
than the Hendrickson holdout in Cincinnati and the McLaurin holdout
in Washington. This one has just played out differently, not common.
And I guess the facts were kind of right in
front of our eyes because obviously Michaeh he was not
going to play on this contract.
Speaker 2 (01:36):
That you could tell that was a fact. The other
fact was there was.
Speaker 3 (01:39):
No communication between the Cowboys and his agent. So if
you add those together, I don't see how a deal
could get done. So what's the alternative. It's going to
have to be a trade. And that's the route they went. Now,
they must have changed their minds at some point because
it looked like, uh, they were trying to sign him
way back in the spring and then through the summer,
(02:01):
and that number was going to be big. They knew that,
and it seemed like they were fine with that. That's
how we're gonna build it. You know, we're gonna put
a lot of money into two or three into three players.
But at some point they changed their minds. So, you know,
the hard part is getting back true value for a
player like his, with his ability and his youth. It's
hard to do. But what they're gonna do is they're
(02:24):
going to try and add the draft picks, add the
cap space, and from green Bay standpoint, it's it's really
interesting just because they've been building towards this for the
last couple of years. This hasn't just been like a
couple of weeks where they look at it and they see, hey,
there's a premier pass rusher.
Speaker 2 (02:38):
Let's go after him.
Speaker 3 (02:40):
They've been trying to acquire a veteran pass rusher for
a long time.
Speaker 2 (02:43):
But there they're GM.
Speaker 3 (02:45):
Brian Goodikuantz has has kind of lined them up to
do this right now. They have a pretty young roster,
they have a lot of players and Murkey contracts, so
it gives them the flexibility when this game available because
it's a big price tige this time of year and
now a lot of teams are budgeted cash and cap
wise to add a player of this magnitude, well, they
were ready to do it. So he's going to make
(03:05):
a good defense even better, you know, I know, Dallas said,
they'll be better without Mike. I mean that's not reality
right now. I mean down the road, if some things
happen with the money that they now have to spend
in the draft picks, maybe you can say that. But
right now they're obviously not going to be as strong.
And it just is what it is. But it's been
a really interesting whole dynamic just because there aren't a
(03:26):
whole lot of negotiations that don't have the agent involved,
not that I've been a part of, unless the player
doesn't have an agent. So this was different than the
Cowboys have done it different ways, And I'd love to
hear from Skin too, because I know the Cowboys in
the past. They've done plenty of big deals with their
own players, so they've done these before they negotiate with agents.
I just don't understand this was different for whatever reason.
Speaker 2 (03:48):
And you know why was an agent part of this?
But they're agent's part of the other deals.
Speaker 3 (03:51):
That's you know, from the outset looking in, I don't know,
And I do this for a living, trying to handicap this.
Speaker 2 (03:56):
Not really sure why that was the case, but that
seemed like that was the case with this such.
Speaker 1 (04:01):
And Skin I think let's circle back to that point
in a second. Just just give us the level set, like,
what what is the the millions of diehard Dallas Cowboy fans?
How are they feeling today?
Speaker 4 (04:13):
They feel triple gutted for a lot of reasons. One
as I think the fan base, you know, there's a difference.
The NFL is the biggest animal by far. But you know,
if you live in Dallas, you're a Mavericks fan and
a Rangers fan, and you're a Cowboys fan and a
Stars fan. And so this is a sports fan base
that is still reeling from the Luca trade. And so
(04:37):
you have the best player on your team for both
franchises changed before they enter their prime or as they
enter their prime. And it seems to be for reasons
that you, you know, whatever you want to project on it.
A lot of people project ego onto this this sort
of thing, and I think, you know, I'm not trying
(04:58):
to be a sin a cool, grumpy guy, but we're
on thirty years of this behavior from the Dallas Cowboys,
So I'm emotionally speaking, I'm unfazed by it. I you know,
it's the problem is the logic with which the Cowboys
use to do things. They don't seem to have a philosophy.
(05:19):
They yank it all over the road. Let me ask you, guys,
and you know, name a superstar player the Cowboys drafted
since Jerry Jones has been there that they didn't keep.
I don't think there's one. You know. I'm not going
to sit here and say DeMarco Murray was a superstar.
He was a good running back. I remember not being
he went within the division. And it didn't bust me
(05:40):
up that they if you are a superstar, Jerry keeps you.
He may do this, you know, little routine that he
does and say the things and love all the juice
and all the talk about it, but they get the
guy done. You could have made an incredible argument, and
we did on our sports talk show. I didn't want
to resign Ezekiel Elliott, not because I don't think he
(06:01):
was a great player, but I personally never give a
running back excuse me that second contract. And I mean
there's some guys like Saquon I get it, but they're
so rare, and Ezekiel wasn't that guy. He showed signs of,
you know, starting to diminish a little bit. So you
don't do that with that position. What you do is
(06:23):
you franchise him, and if it upsets the apple cart,
so be it. But that's not how the Cowboys just
don't have a good philosophy. And this if you had
told me right before the draft, we're gonna trade Micah Parsons,
you I can understand that and you can make it
make sense to me because you can't have two of
the top seven highest paid non quarterbacks in the NFL
(06:46):
and the highest paid quarterback in the NFL. That stupid business.
So if you had done it going into the draft,
when you can put a good deal together, I get it.
That's not what happened here. This is ego and we've
seen it play out year after year after year. And
I don't know if you guys watched it, but we all,
(07:06):
just as our community, just watched this Netflix special, which
is eight episodes of Jerry Jones's Flawed and his ego
has drug fan bases through the mud for thirty years.
And it happened again. This trade happened because Jerry insulted
that agent, and guys, I know way more about the
(07:27):
NBA than the NFL, and Tom I might be speaking
out of turn here, but what I see in the
NBA is when you upset the agent, he gets you
out of there and he gets you where he wants
you to be. And Jerry took ridiculous shots at that agent,
disrespect him. And this isn't some third rate agent. This
(07:48):
is a big time guy with big time clients. And
you know who some of his biggest clients are. They're
in Green Bay, like Jordan Love. And so you don't
make a deal like this a week before the season
starts because there's, like Tom said, there's so few teams
that can do it. This was an ego deal. And
(08:09):
now the ego you've gone to the edge of the
cliff and Jerry's not going to back down as he's
insulting everybody. And you guys saw Tom, you say you
saw how Mike was acting. They they traded a generational
pass rusher a week before the season because ego got
in the way. This is the kind of thing that
drives Cowboys fans bonkers.
Speaker 1 (08:31):
I tell you what, when you're introduced is having tremendous
passion and knowledge. That's how you deliver people in their
company statement, That's how you deliver. Hey, Tom, I want
to I want to ask you, like a practical logistics
question that Skin just touched upon, which is part of
the challenge here building a team. You know, in Bill
Barnwell's article today at ESPN, he cited the fact that
(08:53):
no team has had a winning season in which they're
allocating fifty percent or more of their cap to three players. Wow,
cd Am, Dak Prescott, and now Micah Parsons. Did they
invest in the right guys? It was my first question
to you, and then Skin, I want to kick it
back to you. You kind of alluded to a lot
of this, but why were they able to get to
yes with the first two guys and not with Micah Parsons.
Speaker 3 (09:17):
Well, first to go with Bill Barnwell does excellent stuff.
By the way, I wish I knew how many teams
have had that that much cap. I mean, it may
only be a couple teams, So you know, I'd like
to see like the the actual numbers with that. But
I'm not saying you can't do it. I mean you
have to draft really well, and you have to have
a lot of players on your contract on your roster
(09:39):
that are on rookie contracts, and that's that's can kind
of get you that path where you can spend a
lot on some other players if you have to pay
your quarterback. When I was with the Chargers, I knew
once we paid Justin Herbert, we're we have to transition
and have more younger players on offense and defense, and
more rookie contracts because lower base salary, lower cap numbers.
We started that process before we signed him. So not
(10:01):
saying you can't do it, but it does make it
more difficult as you put your team together when you have,
you know, three players making that much money, but if
it's your franchise quarterback and a pass rusher and a receiver,
at least you're paying the right people and they're paying
their own, which is even better. They know what they're getting,
They drafted, they developed, and then that you want to
pay your own.
Speaker 4 (10:23):
And to jump in there, I think, and Tom brought
it up. You know, when you do pay Dak and
we that's a discussion that happens in every city unless
it's like no brainer. Patrick Mahomes, you know, we had
so many discussions on the radio, all right, how good
is Dak? And we usually settled in all right, he's
probably somewhere between the eighth best quarterback and the fourteenth
(10:44):
best quarterback, and if you have the right team around him,
you can win. You could make the argument two seasons ago.
You know, Dak got hurt last year, but two seasons
ago he was MVP runner up, right, If he has
the right guys around him, you can absolutely win a
Super Bowl with that Prescott. The problem is, and by
the way, the Cowboys I believe have drafted pretty well
(11:06):
the last five or six seasons, but there are two
horrific first round misses and they both happen to be
on the defensive line. Taco Charlton Charlton. Instead of drafting Watt,
which you know every team's got, you could have taken
this guy. That's so be it. Everybody in the league
pasted on Tom Brady whatever. Like, everyone has their misses
that happens, but missing on Taco and then missing on
(11:29):
Mazzie Smith when they absolutely are so thin at defensive
tackle really really hurt this team. If they had hit
on even one of those guys. You you know, to
Tom's point, you look at it differently. If you've got
guys on rookie contracts that are filling those other holes,
then you can be top heavy but the Cowboys weren't,
and so you know, I look at it, and if
(11:53):
you are going to put all that money in Dak,
I think you have to give him one dynamic at
least one dynamic weapon. And then they made the Pickings deal,
and let's see how that works out. I mean, that's
a mer curial guy. You know, they're going to have
to decide if they want to give that guy a
contract at the end of this year. But they are
so thin, like they're thin at linebacker, they're thin at quarterback.
(12:15):
They paid Trayvon Diggs at the time when they signed Digs,
I didn't have a problem with it, and then Diggs
has been hurt ever since. Right then they got lucky
because Deron Bland can absolutely play. So that's the nature
of the game. Sometimes you hit on some guys you
didn't think they step up, and then sometimes you miss
at the top. But I go back to that just
(12:36):
looking at the list that I saw today with Micah
and Ceedee Lamb both on it, and then you know
how much money is going towards Dak. I just don't
think the Cowboys have done well enough in other areas
to justify that. But again, nothing has changed since last
February or March. You knew that back then. They were
still trying to give Micah this deal a week ago.
(13:00):
Right Like, if my kid just said, oh yeah, I'll
take whatever deal me and Jerry shook hands on before
they shut my agent out, they would have paid all
three of those guys that money. They were going to
do that. So today to say, well, we got a
thirty year old tackle that's coming off of an OK
year and a couple of first round picks for a
team with Super Bowl aspirations. This is what we wanted.
(13:22):
That's disingenuous at best. If they wanted that strategy, they
would have employed that strategy three or four months ago
and got it a significantly better deal. This is just
life of being a Dallas Cowboys fan. And then you
have to hear them sit up there on that podium
and spend that BS and it's just it's nauseating. And
(13:43):
I'm again, I know I sound emotional right now you
start talking about it, but I really am immune to
this stuff at this point. I expect this sort of
thing from the Dallas Cowboys and I you know, the
Packers are super contenders. Again, the Packers have won Super
Bowl since the Cowboys were even in an NFC championship game.
(14:05):
We're going on thirty years of this stuff. Man, it's
it's exhausting if you follow this franchise.
Speaker 1 (14:13):
Yeah, it's it's it's remarkable to see from Afar and Tom.
I wonder if you could speak to this because one
other thing that seems to be a pattern of behavior
by the Cowboys is they wait till the last minute
to sign these guys, and it seems as if they
end up having to spend more money because of that strategy.
You know, Miles Garrett gets signed at the beginning of
this offseason for forty million dollars a year, which obviously
(14:34):
is a large sum of money. If they were first
to market in going to Parsons at that point, is
it reasonable that they could have gotten that deal, because
it seems interesting in the football world different from them.
Baseball just seems like whoever signs latest gets the most money.
It's less about who was actually the best player, and
so it seems like there's a way be first to market,
not last to market. Why are they consistently last to
(14:55):
market here on signing their players?
Speaker 3 (14:58):
Well, first of all, and then Micah ca and this
is the way I think it went. I'm not so sure.
Mike and his agent wanted to be first. So hey,
let's let's let all these guys sign and then when
they're all done, then we'll know where the ceiling is
and then we'll go. So I'm not going to hold
the Cowboys to to that. Now that the Dak Prescott
cedde Lamb, that could be different. Now there's different philosophies
(15:19):
on being first to market. So like Bill Pulling is
a Hall of fame gm okay, Joe Banner really could
be a Hall of fame gm okay. They both did
it different ways, different philosophies. Both can work. Joe Banner
would sign everybody early, okay, so you had a smaller
body of work on the player. Now, with a Micah Parsons,
you kind of know what he's going to be, but
(15:40):
not every player is like that. So but your smaller
body of work, you make a decision to put to
invest money in the player, so you know there's some
there's some misfactor there.
Speaker 2 (15:50):
Bill Pulling was different.
Speaker 3 (15:51):
He wanted a full body of work on the player
before he decided to make a big investment. Some of
that was you know, we were a cash to cap team,
and if you put a big amount of money into
a player and it doesn't pan out, boy, that's a
lot less money we have to spend somewhere else. Now,
if your team that can spend cash over cap, you
can make some missus here or there and you can
kind of buy your way out it for a little bit.
But again, two different philosophies both can work. Dallas has
(16:14):
been more the bill philosophy that they want a bigger
body of work. Sometimes. I mean sometimes maybe the agent
just doesn't want to get going early. So but obviously, yes,
the earlier you can sign a player who's a known
player for you, the better because it'll give you more flexibility.
I mean, we just saw with the pass rushers where
it started, where it ended. I mean, it goes by
fast and almost every free agent we ever signed. You
(16:38):
do the deal and you're kind of clenching your teeth. Boy,
it seems like more than we really wanted to do.
And less than twelve months later, you look at your
own dealer like, oh, this is a good deal.
Speaker 2 (16:46):
Look at all the.
Speaker 3 (16:47):
Guys that already passed them. Boy, we got a great deal,
great value. So yeah, doing the deals early. There's positive
negatives to everything. Obviously, do a deal early and the
player gets hurt. Okay, now you're not getting your return
on it. You do it too good, a deal too
early and the player wants to come back to the
table a lot earlier, and you're losing all your value there.
It doesn't mean you have to do a new deal
(17:07):
with the player. But but you know, so Dallas has
done it their way. But I think in this Micah one,
I'm not so sure the agent didn't didn't say, Hey, look,
my guy is an All Pro player, he's young, and
we're gonna wait for these other guys to go and
when they're done, then what we'll talk after that?
Speaker 1 (17:23):
Go ahead?
Speaker 4 (17:24):
Well, I was gonna say, uh, from all the things
here in the media circles, Tom's exactly right on that.
The one caveat there is that it was Micah that
always wanted to be a Dallas cowboy and loved having
the star on his helmet. And from the way some
of the reports are, if they're accurate, they could have
gotten Micah done a year and a half ago because
(17:46):
Micah was chomping at the bit, and this is probably
why Jerry was so comfortable just dealing with Micah and
thought he got a deal done and he was like no, no, no, no, no,
we don't get down like that, and and that's fine.
The response should not be to say, I don't even
know what what's his name's name is? And you know,
it's like, there's a way to handle things that don't
go your way, and Jerry just doesn't handle anything well
(18:09):
that doesn't go his way, and then he makes it
personal and then we get the situation that we get.
I think the way Tom laid it out is exactly right.
But ultimately, the agent works for the player, and if
the player really wants to be somewhere, you can get
something something done. I also like what Tom says. I'm
a big believer in this, and I think this sizes
back to the Cowboys. There are multiple ways to go
(18:33):
about something and be successful. There's not just one way.
And I love this all the time, Like when a
team kind of emerges with a new trend and there
was like, oh, well that's the way to win, and
so much talk in the NBA, for example, has been
about three point shooting, for example, and I would say, okay, well,
now all the defenses are adjusting to three point shooting. So, man,
that mid range shot is going to be open for
(18:54):
teams if it becomes a high percentage shot if a
guy knocks it down. You know, analytics are based on
what's already happened. Those numbers can change as your strategies
change over time, and then the numbers are going to change, right.
There's going to be things that the game adapts and
evolves as someone sets a new trend and then you
counter that trend. The problem I have with how the
(19:15):
Cowboys have done it. I think you can say their
strategy is to draft and sign their own, and they
do do that. And if you look at the guys
the Cowboys signed earlier, it's usually guys that give them
deals because they really want to be there. Like that's
worked out well for the Cowboys, but all of their
big time players do come down to the very end here.
But the thing that I get frustrated with is there
(19:38):
is not a definable philosophy that the Cowboys have. Even
if that philosophy quote unquote evolves or changes, that's good,
that's smart. You don't want to be stuck in one way,
But man, they yank it all over the damn road
and that's why. And maybe I'm reading too much into
this series. It's Jerry Jones, the gambler, and everything is
(20:00):
shoot from your hip and woo, I was lucky in Oil.
I'm gonna get lucky again. And I just I know
that from when you know, me and Ben spent a
lot of time around you and JD and AJ and
the guys and having conversation. You guys had a plan
and you also had alternate plans for if your plan
didn't work. You guys, whether it was gonna work or not,
(20:23):
you had a philosophy and a strategy and you built
that and you went for it. I'm so enamored with
what Sam Presty has done in Oklahoma City and a
small market because I kind of know a little bit
about how he views things. It may not work, but
it is a strategy and thought has gone into that.
And I get so frustrated with the Cowboys because I
(20:45):
think that Jerry doesn't allow them to have a consistent
strategy that's well thought out. Everything is about the sizzle
and the deal and all that stuff, and it's just
not a way to have a winning team, as evidence
in a league where everyone takes a turn going to
the championship game. They can't seem to get in line.
It's it's maddening.
Speaker 1 (21:07):
It's been referenced a few times on the show here,
and I just want to say, in Major League Baseball,
if you negotiate directly with a player, you're going to
lose your job. Like so, it's fascinating to me that
one of the undercurrents of this story is that Jerry
not only was negotiating directly, but also seemingly was outraged
and was not going to allow the agent to participate.
(21:27):
Shifting gears for a second here, back to Jerry, I
just don't real quickly.
Speaker 3 (21:31):
So just with so we don't have or we the
NFL doesn't have that rule. I mean, the agent has
to be certified. He can't negotiate with a non certified agent.
But there's no rule you can't negotiate directly with the player.
I've never done it. Well, we did it once because
the player didn't have an agent. But yeah, they're not
circumventing the CBA by talking directly to the player. But
(21:52):
usually the player to say, look, you know, call my
agent and look the especially in this contract, Mike is
paying his agent a lot of money for guidance consultation
on these contracts. His agent has done this hundreds thousands
of times before. He does it for a living. The
player doesn't do this for a living, so he should
want to use an agent, and he was. But but yeah,
(22:15):
there was Dallas in doing anything that was against the
CBA by talking directly to the player.
Speaker 1 (22:20):
It's remarkable. I mean, in baseball, just fundamentally, for this
very reason, you have to work with the representative because
it's assumed that they have more knowledge in the space
and will represent the player better than the player at
ken himself. Not to rub a little lemon juice in
the old wound here, but I'm going to read a
few quotes from Jerry Jones that I love your reaction
and quoting here. This was a move to get us
(22:42):
successful in the playoffs. This was a move to be
better on defense. Obviously we didn't think it was the
best interest of our organization, not only the future, but
right now this season as well. This gives us a
chance to be a better team period. How do you
think the average fan is responding to that?
Speaker 4 (23:00):
I think I think the average fan Jerry's one of
those guys when you're around him. It's fun to be
around him. But I think even the average fan is
tired of his BS, right, and so these sorts of
things they just ring hollow. And theoretically what he said
is accurate, So then do it when you can get
(23:20):
a much better deal. Three months ago. Nothing's changed. They
haven't been able to stop the run the entire time.
Micah Parsons was there racking up this incredible you know,
pass rush rate and uh, you know, getting these sacks
and you know you have to double sometimes triple team him.
They've never been able to stop to run this entire time.
So they knew this. So in theory, what Jerry's saying
(23:42):
is accurate. It's just after the fact. BS, they would
have aggressively addressed it months ago, and so it's like
they got cornered into the deal, and this is how
they spin it. And that's what I think drives all
the fans crazy because we have this long track record
of this sort of behavior. And again, man in the
(24:03):
press conference yesterday, Jerry Jones told a story that he
has told a hundred times about a contract dealing with
Michael Irvin, in which he said something clever about the
city of El Paso, and Michael threw up his hands.
He's like, I can't deal with you, Jerry, You're the best,
and then going over and signs the deal. So we're
(24:23):
talking about something that happened in the mid nineties, and
that that's what he's sitting up on the stage talking about.
He's talking, he's referencing, Well, you know, I've done a
million deals, and it's and it's it's maddening that we're
still stuck in that time warp. And it's good to
know what Tom said. I didn't realize that you could
(24:44):
quote unquote negotiate with the player. But you know, it
doesn't really matter because if the deal is not done, okay,
how do we how do we get it done? If
you want to be here and we want you here,
how do we get this done? And the answer is
to not pretend like you don't know the agent's name
and go insult him on a Michael Irban podcast. That's
not the way to get the deal done.
Speaker 1 (25:07):
Tom. One last question for you. I'm just curious from
our general manager's perspective, it seems to me like these
deals are extremely difficult to make period. But additionally, because
you really there are three parties involved because there's a
sign and trade effectively going on here, or a sign
right after the trade, so it's the two teams and
the player. So part of what the Packers are giving
(25:30):
up in this deal is signing Micah to a very
lucrative contract, but that contract has no value to the Cowboys. Similarly,
when the Cowboys are getting draft picks back by definition
by giving them Micah Parsons, they're devaluing those draft picks
because now they should be better. So there's some kind
of wonkiness in my opinion of like how you value
these things, which I imagine is why these are really tough
(25:52):
deals to make, because when the Green Bay Packers are saying, hey, listen,
part of what we're giving up here is this exceptionally
large contract, and the Cowboys say, well, that doesn't do
us any good and we're still looking for value elsewhere,
like how much does the does those things kind of
complicate these types of.
Speaker 3 (26:07):
Deals, Well, I wouldn't want to hear the other team
complaining because you know they're part of this trade and
they're they're trading for an all pro players, So you
have to give up something, and you better give up
a lot. But typically when there's draft picks involved, or
draft picks and players for the trade involved plus a contract,
you always want to hammer out the compensation as far
(26:27):
as what the trade parameters are going to be first.
I would never want to let the other team start
negotiating with the player first. They get that done, and
then now you start to lose some leverage because now
the player knows, hey, look, I got this deal done
with Green Bay for whatever. It's going to be forty
five million a year. We got to make this deal,
and they start losing a little bit of leverage. So
it was always, hey, let's get the parameters done first,
(26:47):
and we nail those down, okay, and have a verbal
agreement on that.
Speaker 2 (26:51):
Now you can talk to the agent.
Speaker 3 (26:54):
But you know, this is a it's a difficult deal
to do just because the contract is a contract. But
what's the right compensation. Going back to the Cowboys and
two first round draft picks and a and a proven player,
it sounds good, you know those two draft picks. You know,
best case scenario, you get you know, a starter, maybe
(27:15):
two starters, maybe you get a pro bowler, and you
get them for four years at below market prices. But
The reality of it is, the draft is it's a
little bit like lottery.
Speaker 2 (27:25):
Take us.
Speaker 3 (27:25):
Now, the higher you pick that you have a better chance.
But fifty five percent of players in the first round
sign a second contract with that club. Okay, very few
actually become All pros. So you're getting two first round
draft picks, but I'll tell you you'll hit on one.
And the Cowboys have drafted pretty well, so they have
a chance to get on both. Okay, but is one
(27:46):
of them going to be at a premier position and
an All Pro player?
Speaker 2 (27:49):
Well, that's hard to say.
Speaker 3 (27:52):
So you look at some of the trades in the
past of teams that decide, all right, we don't want
to pay this player, but we'll just draft as replacement. Well,
Tennessee's send Aj Brown to Philly, Okay, we'll just draft
Trailing Burks as his replacement in the first round. Didn't
work Okay, San Francisco is same thing with the Forrest Buckner.
We're gonna pay some other players, will trade him to
the Colts, and we'll draft his replacement. Javon Kinlaw didn't
(28:15):
work out, So you can't just guarantee that, Hey, we're
trading parsons, but we now we'll have two Pro Bowl
players to take his place. Maybe that happens, but the
odds say that's that's gonna be a little bit low. So,
like Skin said earlier, if this was done in March
and April, you just have more teams competing, more teams
are budget at that point, cash and cap wise to
(28:39):
do a deal, and then that kind of will increase
your compensation back because you'd have a lot of teams
competing for Micha Parsons. It wouldn't be just one. But
you do it now, it's just less people involved. When
there's less people involved, you can't get you lose some leverage,
you don't have as much coming back.
Speaker 1 (28:53):
Yeah, I couldn't agree with you more, Tom. I always
felt like you look at these deals and is is
this the best deal you can make or is the
best deal you can make right now? Or with some
other qualifiers. And when you're trading elite players, you never
want there to be a qualifier. You never want there
to be a drag on the value of the trade.
And you guys know more about the NFL in this
market than I do, but it just feels like there
(29:14):
was a drag here. Skin. My last question for you.
You kind of alluded to this earlier and for the
listeners to know Skin has like a PhD in the NBA,
So I'm going to link it back in here is
what is the state of the Dallas Fort Worth fan
base right now? Like, on the positive side, the Rangers
win the World Series in twenty twenty three, you got
Cooper Flag in the first round, but you've also lost
(29:35):
Micah Parsons and Luka Doncic. It seems like there's a
lot of highs and lows. There's a lot of heartbreak
mixed in there. When the dust settles, how are they feeling?
Speaker 4 (29:44):
I think right now the fan base is completely battered.
And I think, you know, the NFL is so crazy
because so much of it's going to come down to
injuries and what players get injured. I mean, I think
you know, with relatively good health, the Cowboys are going
to be in an eight or nine win team, and
with some bad health then you're looking at a five
or six win team, and that's not going to make
(30:05):
anybody in the fan base feel good. I think. I actually,
if you look at trading Luca and how lucky they
got with Cooper Flag, I actually really like the Mavericks
team if Kyrie Irving is healthy and Kyrie Irving ain't healthy,
so they don't have enough shooting and they don't have
enough playmaking. But they have a chance to be a
(30:28):
top three defensive team in the league. I wholeheartedly believe that.
I know the way Jason Kid coaches, and if he's
willing to put Anthony Davis and Derek Lively the second
and PJ. Washington Junior, who's their best primter defender, and
also six seven with long arms out there with Cooper Flag,
that is a dominant defensive team. But they don't have
enough shooting and they don't have enough playmaking for the
(30:50):
modern NBA. So I think the fan base is not
going to get to feel that because Kyrie's not coming
back until February, your March, and when he does come back,
maybe he's seventy five percent or eighty percent. I really
think if their health turns around, they got a chance
to be incredible next season, right But when you've been
(31:12):
watching Luka Doncic drag you to the finals, for a fan,
that's not going to feel good for them. The franchise
was saved with the Cooper Flag pick. I mean, I
just I was watching that lottery and man, because we
had dealt with so much. I mean, the Kyrie Irving
(31:32):
injury was devastating. You guys, know, when you have a
star and he gets hurt, it's devastating. And Kyrie literally
just put the team on his back and was doing
amazing things. And there's all this baggage that came with
Kyrie before he arrived. And let me just tell you, guys,
he has been wonderful. And I was from being from afar,
(31:54):
not knowing him personally, I was scared because of what
you read and what you see, I have not seen
any of that. He's been amazing to work with. He's
been a leader.
Speaker 2 (32:05):
You know.
Speaker 4 (32:05):
I think the Mavericks got the benefit of getting him
after he went through all of that hell and was
drugged through the media, mud and all that stuff in
Boston and Brooklyn. And I'm not absolving him of any
of his own doing, but it seems like he had
emerged from that in a wonderful place and then he
gets a pretty catastrophic injury. Right. And so if you
watched one half of Anthony Davis and Kyrie Irving together
(32:28):
when they played the Rockets, they looked like an elite team,
and then Anthony Davis gets hurt. So it's a long
way of saying that this fan base has been drugged
through the mud, the emotional mud, and I don't know
that they're gonna get the immediate dividends to pull him
out of it. I think that the fall and the
in January February time is going to be a lot
(32:51):
of hits to him, and it's gonna be the Cowboys
and the Mavericks happening at the same time. And who
knows what happens with the Rangers. Man, they got a
lot of injuries, and boy, the Bats didn't come to
get So it feels like a dark time for the
fan base who can never see the you know, past
the immediate problems. I think that things will turn around
(33:13):
with relative health, but it's going to be five or
six months down the road before anybody sees that, Hey.
Speaker 2 (33:19):
Coop Cooper flag this year.
Speaker 3 (33:21):
Okay, arch Manning next year, and we'll forget all about this,
that this all happened.
Speaker 4 (33:27):
I will be fine, Tom, Thank you for promising me
that I heard it right here on this podcast. Guaranteed
me that's gonna happen. But Yeah, that would be that
would be nice. And then you have this dragantic contract
with Dak and everyone yelling that they want the rookie
to play.
Speaker 3 (33:44):
Always got to look at the balance side.
Speaker 1 (33:47):
I think you've inspired us to do a show on
all the conspiracy theories around the draft lottery and frozen
enflopes and sticky sticky ping pong balls, because no franchise
needed the number one pick more than the Dallas man Well,
I want to thank you, guys, both the tremendous wisdom
of the general manager here from Tom, and the exceptional
(34:07):
passion and the knowledge of the fan base from you Skin.
Thank you guys for joining us. Please join me host
bad Levine, Ryan McDonough and other general managers every week
for Roster Syringes on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get
your podcasts.
Speaker 4 (34:24):
Welcome
Welcome to a special episode of Rosters to Rings where
we break down the incredibly impactful trade between the Green
Bay Packers and the Dallas Cowboys. Micah Parsons heads to
Green Bay, Kenny Clark and two first round picks come
back to Dallas. Let's discuss it here on Rosters to Rings.
(00:25):
Alongside Tom toe LESCo, I am Thad Levine. We are
ecstatic to be joined by Jeff skin Wade of the
famous Ben and Skin Show. In addition to being an
accomplished media mogul and a well above average basketball player,
Skin represents the heartbeat of the Dallas Fort Worth Metroplex
fan base. No one is more knowledge of and passion
for sports and greater Dallas than does Skin. But I
(00:47):
want to start the conversation here with Tom Bombshell dropped
yesterday in the NFL. Micah Parsons traded by the Dallas
Cowboys to the Packers for Kenny Clark and two first
round picks. Give our listeners a a general manager's view
of this deal? What what does the value as you
assess it?
Speaker 2 (01:04):
Well?
Speaker 3 (01:05):
First of mean where to start? I mean, I just
I just finished three hours on NFL Radio and all
we talked about was the trade, how it affects Doles,
how it to affects Green Bay, what went into it.
Speaker 2 (01:15):
And this has been a huge story, and.
Speaker 3 (01:17):
It's this one's so unique because there's so much different
than the Hendrickson holdout in Cincinnati and the McLaurin holdout
in Washington. This one has just played out differently, not common.
And I guess the facts were kind of right in
front of our eyes because obviously Michaeh he was not
going to play on this contract.
Speaker 2 (01:36):
That you could tell that was a fact. The other
fact was there was.
Speaker 3 (01:39):
No communication between the Cowboys and his agent. So if
you add those together, I don't see how a deal
could get done. So what's the alternative. It's going to
have to be a trade. And that's the route they went. Now,
they must have changed their minds at some point because
it looked like, uh, they were trying to sign him
way back in the spring and then through the summer,
(02:01):
and that number was going to be big. They knew that,
and it seemed like they were fine with that. That's
how we're gonna build it. You know, we're gonna put
a lot of money into two or three into three players.
But at some point they changed their minds. So, you know,
the hard part is getting back true value for a
player like his, with his ability and his youth. It's
hard to do. But what they're gonna do is they're
(02:24):
going to try and add the draft picks, add the
cap space, and from green Bay standpoint, it's it's really
interesting just because they've been building towards this for the
last couple of years. This hasn't just been like a
couple of weeks where they look at it and they see, hey,
there's a premier pass rusher.
Speaker 2 (02:38):
Let's go after him.
Speaker 3 (02:40):
They've been trying to acquire a veteran pass rusher for
a long time.
Speaker 2 (02:43):
But there they're GM.
Speaker 3 (02:45):
Brian Goodikuantz has has kind of lined them up to
do this right now. They have a pretty young roster,
they have a lot of players and Murkey contracts, so
it gives them the flexibility when this game available because
it's a big price tige this time of year and
now a lot of teams are budgeted cash and cap
wise to add a player of this magnitude, well, they
were ready to do it. So he's going to make
(03:05):
a good defense even better, you know, I know, Dallas said,
they'll be better without Mike. I mean that's not reality
right now. I mean down the road, if some things
happen with the money that they now have to spend
in the draft picks, maybe you can say that. But
right now they're obviously not going to be as strong.
And it just is what it is. But it's been
a really interesting whole dynamic just because there aren't a
(03:26):
whole lot of negotiations that don't have the agent involved,
not that I've been a part of, unless the player
doesn't have an agent. So this was different than the
Cowboys have done it different ways, And I'd love to
hear from Skin too, because I know the Cowboys in
the past. They've done plenty of big deals with their
own players, so they've done these before they negotiate with agents.
I just don't understand this was different for whatever reason.
Speaker 2 (03:48):
And you know why was an agent part of this?
But they're agent's part of the other deals.
Speaker 3 (03:51):
That's you know, from the outset looking in, I don't know,
And I do this for a living, trying to handicap this.
Speaker 2 (03:56):
Not really sure why that was the case, but that
seemed like that was the case with this such.
Speaker 1 (04:01):
And Skin I think let's circle back to that point
in a second. Just just give us the level set, like,
what what is the the millions of diehard Dallas Cowboy fans?
How are they feeling today?
Speaker 4 (04:13):
They feel triple gutted for a lot of reasons. One
as I think the fan base, you know, there's a difference.
The NFL is the biggest animal by far. But you know,
if you live in Dallas, you're a Mavericks fan and
a Rangers fan, and you're a Cowboys fan and a
Stars fan. And so this is a sports fan base
that is still reeling from the Luca trade. And so
(04:37):
you have the best player on your team for both
franchises changed before they enter their prime or as they
enter their prime. And it seems to be for reasons
that you, you know, whatever you want to project on it.
A lot of people project ego onto this this sort
of thing, and I think, you know, I'm not trying
(04:58):
to be a sin a cool, grumpy guy, but we're
on thirty years of this behavior from the Dallas Cowboys,
So I'm emotionally speaking, I'm unfazed by it. I you know,
it's the problem is the logic with which the Cowboys
use to do things. They don't seem to have a philosophy.
(05:19):
They yank it all over the road. Let me ask you, guys,
and you know, name a superstar player the Cowboys drafted
since Jerry Jones has been there that they didn't keep.
I don't think there's one. You know. I'm not going
to sit here and say DeMarco Murray was a superstar.
He was a good running back. I remember not being
he went within the division. And it didn't bust me
(05:40):
up that they if you are a superstar, Jerry keeps you.
He may do this, you know, little routine that he
does and say the things and love all the juice
and all the talk about it, but they get the
guy done. You could have made an incredible argument, and
we did on our sports talk show. I didn't want
to resign Ezekiel Elliott, not because I don't think he
(06:01):
was a great player, but I personally never give a
running back excuse me that second contract. And I mean
there's some guys like Saquon I get it, but they're
so rare, and Ezekiel wasn't that guy. He showed signs of,
you know, starting to diminish a little bit. So you
don't do that with that position. What you do is
(06:23):
you franchise him, and if it upsets the apple cart,
so be it. But that's not how the Cowboys just
don't have a good philosophy. And this if you had
told me right before the draft, we're gonna trade Micah Parsons,
you I can understand that and you can make it
make sense to me because you can't have two of
the top seven highest paid non quarterbacks in the NFL
(06:46):
and the highest paid quarterback in the NFL. That stupid business.
So if you had done it going into the draft,
when you can put a good deal together, I get it.
That's not what happened here. This is ego and we've
seen it play out year after year after year. And
I don't know if you guys watched it, but we all,
(07:06):
just as our community, just watched this Netflix special, which
is eight episodes of Jerry Jones's Flawed and his ego
has drug fan bases through the mud for thirty years.
And it happened again. This trade happened because Jerry insulted
that agent, and guys, I know way more about the
(07:27):
NBA than the NFL, and Tom I might be speaking
out of turn here, but what I see in the
NBA is when you upset the agent, he gets you
out of there and he gets you where he wants
you to be. And Jerry took ridiculous shots at that agent,
disrespect him. And this isn't some third rate agent. This
(07:48):
is a big time guy with big time clients. And
you know who some of his biggest clients are. They're
in Green Bay, like Jordan Love. And so you don't
make a deal like this a week before the season
starts because there's, like Tom said, there's so few teams
that can do it. This was an ego deal. And
(08:09):
now the ego you've gone to the edge of the
cliff and Jerry's not going to back down as he's
insulting everybody. And you guys saw Tom, you say you
saw how Mike was acting. They they traded a generational
pass rusher a week before the season because ego got
in the way. This is the kind of thing that
drives Cowboys fans bonkers.
Speaker 1 (08:31):
I tell you what, when you're introduced is having tremendous
passion and knowledge. That's how you deliver people in their
company statement, That's how you deliver. Hey, Tom, I want
to I want to ask you, like a practical logistics
question that Skin just touched upon, which is part of
the challenge here building a team. You know, in Bill
Barnwell's article today at ESPN, he cited the fact that
(08:53):
no team has had a winning season in which they're
allocating fifty percent or more of their cap to three players. Wow,
cd Am, Dak Prescott, and now Micah Parsons. Did they
invest in the right guys? It was my first question
to you, and then Skin, I want to kick it
back to you. You kind of alluded to a lot
of this, but why were they able to get to
yes with the first two guys and not with Micah Parsons.
Speaker 3 (09:17):
Well, first to go with Bill Barnwell does excellent stuff.
By the way, I wish I knew how many teams
have had that that much cap. I mean, it may
only be a couple teams, So you know, I'd like
to see like the the actual numbers with that. But
I'm not saying you can't do it. I mean you
have to draft really well, and you have to have
a lot of players on your contract on your roster
(09:39):
that are on rookie contracts, and that's that's can kind
of get you that path where you can spend a
lot on some other players if you have to pay
your quarterback. When I was with the Chargers, I knew
once we paid Justin Herbert, we're we have to transition
and have more younger players on offense and defense, and
more rookie contracts because lower base salary, lower cap numbers.
We started that process before we signed him. So not
(10:01):
saying you can't do it, but it does make it
more difficult as you put your team together when you have,
you know, three players making that much money, but if
it's your franchise quarterback and a pass rusher and a receiver,
at least you're paying the right people and they're paying
their own, which is even better. They know what they're getting,
They drafted, they developed, and then that you want to
pay your own.
Speaker 4 (10:23):
And to jump in there, I think, and Tom brought
it up. You know, when you do pay Dak and
we that's a discussion that happens in every city unless
it's like no brainer. Patrick Mahomes, you know, we had
so many discussions on the radio, all right, how good
is Dak? And we usually settled in all right, he's
probably somewhere between the eighth best quarterback and the fourteenth
(10:44):
best quarterback, and if you have the right team around him,
you can win. You could make the argument two seasons ago.
You know, Dak got hurt last year, but two seasons
ago he was MVP runner up, right, If he has
the right guys around him, you can absolutely win a
Super Bowl with that Prescott. The problem is, and by
the way, the Cowboys I believe have drafted pretty well
(11:06):
the last five or six seasons, but there are two
horrific first round misses and they both happen to be
on the defensive line. Taco Charlton Charlton. Instead of drafting Watt,
which you know every team's got, you could have taken
this guy. That's so be it. Everybody in the league
pasted on Tom Brady whatever. Like, everyone has their misses
that happens, but missing on Taco and then missing on
(11:29):
Mazzie Smith when they absolutely are so thin at defensive
tackle really really hurt this team. If they had hit
on even one of those guys. You you know, to
Tom's point, you look at it differently. If you've got
guys on rookie contracts that are filling those other holes,
then you can be top heavy but the Cowboys weren't,
and so you know, I look at it, and if
(11:53):
you are going to put all that money in Dak,
I think you have to give him one dynamic at
least one dynamic weapon. And then they made the Pickings deal,
and let's see how that works out. I mean, that's
a mer curial guy. You know, they're going to have
to decide if they want to give that guy a
contract at the end of this year. But they are
so thin, like they're thin at linebacker, they're thin at quarterback.
(12:15):
They paid Trayvon Diggs at the time when they signed Digs,
I didn't have a problem with it, and then Diggs
has been hurt ever since. Right then they got lucky
because Deron Bland can absolutely play. So that's the nature
of the game. Sometimes you hit on some guys you
didn't think they step up, and then sometimes you miss
at the top. But I go back to that just
(12:36):
looking at the list that I saw today with Micah
and Ceedee Lamb both on it, and then you know
how much money is going towards Dak. I just don't
think the Cowboys have done well enough in other areas
to justify that. But again, nothing has changed since last
February or March. You knew that back then. They were
still trying to give Micah this deal a week ago.
(13:00):
Right Like, if my kid just said, oh yeah, I'll
take whatever deal me and Jerry shook hands on before
they shut my agent out, they would have paid all
three of those guys that money. They were going to
do that. So today to say, well, we got a
thirty year old tackle that's coming off of an OK
year and a couple of first round picks for a
team with Super Bowl aspirations. This is what we wanted.
(13:22):
That's disingenuous at best. If they wanted that strategy, they
would have employed that strategy three or four months ago
and got it a significantly better deal. This is just
life of being a Dallas Cowboys fan. And then you
have to hear them sit up there on that podium
and spend that BS and it's just it's nauseating. And
(13:43):
I'm again, I know I sound emotional right now you
start talking about it, but I really am immune to
this stuff at this point. I expect this sort of
thing from the Dallas Cowboys and I you know, the
Packers are super contenders. Again, the Packers have won Super
Bowl since the Cowboys were even in an NFC championship game.
(14:05):
We're going on thirty years of this stuff. Man, it's
it's exhausting if you follow this franchise.
Speaker 1 (14:13):
Yeah, it's it's it's remarkable to see from Afar and Tom.
I wonder if you could speak to this because one
other thing that seems to be a pattern of behavior
by the Cowboys is they wait till the last minute
to sign these guys, and it seems as if they
end up having to spend more money because of that strategy.
You know, Miles Garrett gets signed at the beginning of
this offseason for forty million dollars a year, which obviously
(14:34):
is a large sum of money. If they were first
to market in going to Parsons at that point, is
it reasonable that they could have gotten that deal, because
it seems interesting in the football world different from them.
Baseball just seems like whoever signs latest gets the most money.
It's less about who was actually the best player, and
so it seems like there's a way be first to market,
not last to market. Why are they consistently last to
(14:55):
market here on signing their players?
Speaker 3 (14:58):
Well, first of all, and then Micah ca and this
is the way I think it went. I'm not so sure.
Mike and his agent wanted to be first. So hey,
let's let's let all these guys sign and then when
they're all done, then we'll know where the ceiling is
and then we'll go. So I'm not going to hold
the Cowboys to to that. Now that the Dak Prescott
cedde Lamb, that could be different. Now there's different philosophies
(15:19):
on being first to market. So like Bill Pulling is
a Hall of fame gm okay, Joe Banner really could
be a Hall of fame gm okay. They both did
it different ways, different philosophies. Both can work. Joe Banner
would sign everybody early, okay, so you had a smaller
body of work on the player. Now, with a Micah Parsons,
you kind of know what he's going to be, but
(15:40):
not every player is like that. So but your smaller
body of work, you make a decision to put to
invest money in the player, so you know there's some
there's some misfactor there.
Speaker 2 (15:50):
Bill Pulling was different.
Speaker 3 (15:51):
He wanted a full body of work on the player
before he decided to make a big investment. Some of
that was you know, we were a cash to cap team,
and if you put a big amount of money into
a player and it doesn't pan out, boy, that's a
lot less money we have to spend somewhere else. Now,
if your team that can spend cash over cap, you
can make some missus here or there and you can
kind of buy your way out it for a little bit.
But again, two different philosophies both can work. Dallas has
(16:14):
been more the bill philosophy that they want a bigger
body of work. Sometimes. I mean sometimes maybe the agent
just doesn't want to get going early. So but obviously, yes,
the earlier you can sign a player who's a known
player for you, the better because it'll give you more flexibility.
I mean, we just saw with the pass rushers where
it started, where it ended. I mean, it goes by
fast and almost every free agent we ever signed. You
(16:38):
do the deal and you're kind of clenching your teeth. Boy,
it seems like more than we really wanted to do.
And less than twelve months later, you look at your
own dealer like, oh, this is a good deal.
Speaker 2 (16:46):
Look at all the.
Speaker 3 (16:47):
Guys that already passed them. Boy, we got a great deal,
great value. So yeah, doing the deals early. There's positive
negatives to everything. Obviously, do a deal early and the
player gets hurt. Okay, now you're not getting your return
on it. You do it too good, a deal too
early and the player wants to come back to the
table a lot earlier, and you're losing all your value there.
It doesn't mean you have to do a new deal
(17:07):
with the player. But but you know, so Dallas has
done it their way. But I think in this Micah one,
I'm not so sure the agent didn't didn't say, Hey, look,
my guy is an All Pro player, he's young, and
we're gonna wait for these other guys to go and
when they're done, then what we'll talk after that?
Speaker 1 (17:23):
Go ahead?
Speaker 4 (17:24):
Well, I was gonna say, uh, from all the things
here in the media circles, Tom's exactly right on that.
The one caveat there is that it was Micah that
always wanted to be a Dallas cowboy and loved having
the star on his helmet. And from the way some
of the reports are, if they're accurate, they could have
gotten Micah done a year and a half ago because
(17:46):
Micah was chomping at the bit, and this is probably
why Jerry was so comfortable just dealing with Micah and
thought he got a deal done and he was like no, no, no, no, no,
we don't get down like that, and and that's fine.
The response should not be to say, I don't even
know what what's his name's name is? And you know,
it's like, there's a way to handle things that don't
go your way, and Jerry just doesn't handle anything well
(18:09):
that doesn't go his way, and then he makes it
personal and then we get the situation that we get.
I think the way Tom laid it out is exactly right.
But ultimately, the agent works for the player, and if
the player really wants to be somewhere, you can get
something something done. I also like what Tom says. I'm
a big believer in this, and I think this sizes
back to the Cowboys. There are multiple ways to go
(18:33):
about something and be successful. There's not just one way.
And I love this all the time, Like when a
team kind of emerges with a new trend and there
was like, oh, well that's the way to win, and
so much talk in the NBA, for example, has been
about three point shooting, for example, and I would say, okay, well,
now all the defenses are adjusting to three point shooting. So, man,
that mid range shot is going to be open for
(18:54):
teams if it becomes a high percentage shot if a
guy knocks it down. You know, analytics are based on
what's already happened. Those numbers can change as your strategies
change over time, and then the numbers are going to change, right.
There's going to be things that the game adapts and
evolves as someone sets a new trend and then you
counter that trend. The problem I have with how the
(19:15):
Cowboys have done it. I think you can say their
strategy is to draft and sign their own, and they
do do that. And if you look at the guys
the Cowboys signed earlier, it's usually guys that give them
deals because they really want to be there. Like that's
worked out well for the Cowboys, but all of their
big time players do come down to the very end here.
But the thing that I get frustrated with is there
(19:38):
is not a definable philosophy that the Cowboys have. Even
if that philosophy quote unquote evolves or changes, that's good,
that's smart. You don't want to be stuck in one way,
But man, they yank it all over the damn road
and that's why. And maybe I'm reading too much into
this series. It's Jerry Jones, the gambler, and everything is
(20:00):
shoot from your hip and woo, I was lucky in Oil.
I'm gonna get lucky again. And I just I know
that from when you know, me and Ben spent a
lot of time around you and JD and AJ and
the guys and having conversation. You guys had a plan
and you also had alternate plans for if your plan
didn't work. You guys, whether it was gonna work or not,
(20:23):
you had a philosophy and a strategy and you built
that and you went for it. I'm so enamored with
what Sam Presty has done in Oklahoma City and a
small market because I kind of know a little bit
about how he views things. It may not work, but
it is a strategy and thought has gone into that.
And I get so frustrated with the Cowboys because I
(20:45):
think that Jerry doesn't allow them to have a consistent
strategy that's well thought out. Everything is about the sizzle
and the deal and all that stuff, and it's just
not a way to have a winning team, as evidence
in a league where everyone takes a turn going to
the championship game. They can't seem to get in line.
It's it's maddening.
Speaker 1 (21:07):
It's been referenced a few times on the show here,
and I just want to say, in Major League Baseball,
if you negotiate directly with a player, you're going to
lose your job. Like so, it's fascinating to me that
one of the undercurrents of this story is that Jerry
not only was negotiating directly, but also seemingly was outraged
and was not going to allow the agent to participate.
(21:27):
Shifting gears for a second here, back to Jerry, I
just don't real quickly.
Speaker 3 (21:31):
So just with so we don't have or we the
NFL doesn't have that rule. I mean, the agent has
to be certified. He can't negotiate with a non certified agent.
But there's no rule you can't negotiate directly with the player.
I've never done it. Well, we did it once because
the player didn't have an agent. But yeah, they're not
circumventing the CBA by talking directly to the player. But
(21:52):
usually the player to say, look, you know, call my
agent and look the especially in this contract, Mike is
paying his agent a lot of money for guidance consultation
on these contracts. His agent has done this hundreds thousands
of times before. He does it for a living. The
player doesn't do this for a living, so he should
want to use an agent, and he was. But but yeah,
(22:15):
there was Dallas in doing anything that was against the
CBA by talking directly to the player.
Speaker 1 (22:20):
It's remarkable. I mean, in baseball, just fundamentally, for this
very reason, you have to work with the representative because
it's assumed that they have more knowledge in the space
and will represent the player better than the player at
ken himself. Not to rub a little lemon juice in
the old wound here, but I'm going to read a
few quotes from Jerry Jones that I love your reaction
and quoting here. This was a move to get us
(22:42):
successful in the playoffs. This was a move to be
better on defense. Obviously we didn't think it was the
best interest of our organization, not only the future, but
right now this season as well. This gives us a
chance to be a better team period. How do you
think the average fan is responding to that?
Speaker 4 (23:00):
I think I think the average fan Jerry's one of
those guys when you're around him. It's fun to be
around him. But I think even the average fan is
tired of his BS, right, and so these sorts of
things they just ring hollow. And theoretically what he said
is accurate, So then do it when you can get
(23:20):
a much better deal. Three months ago. Nothing's changed. They
haven't been able to stop the run the entire time.
Micah Parsons was there racking up this incredible you know,
pass rush rate and uh, you know, getting these sacks
and you know you have to double sometimes triple team him.
They've never been able to stop to run this entire time.
So they knew this. So in theory, what Jerry's saying
(23:42):
is accurate. It's just after the fact. BS, they would
have aggressively addressed it months ago, and so it's like
they got cornered into the deal, and this is how
they spin it. And that's what I think drives all
the fans crazy because we have this long track record
of this sort of behavior. And again, man in the
(24:03):
press conference yesterday, Jerry Jones told a story that he
has told a hundred times about a contract dealing with
Michael Irvin, in which he said something clever about the
city of El Paso, and Michael threw up his hands.
He's like, I can't deal with you, Jerry, You're the best,
and then going over and signs the deal. So we're
(24:23):
talking about something that happened in the mid nineties, and
that that's what he's sitting up on the stage talking about.
He's talking, he's referencing, Well, you know, I've done a
million deals, and it's and it's it's maddening that we're
still stuck in that time warp. And it's good to
know what Tom said. I didn't realize that you could
(24:44):
quote unquote negotiate with the player. But you know, it
doesn't really matter because if the deal is not done, okay,
how do we how do we get it done? If
you want to be here and we want you here,
how do we get this done? And the answer is
to not pretend like you don't know the agent's name
and go insult him on a Michael Irban podcast. That's
not the way to get the deal done.
Speaker 1 (25:07):
Tom. One last question for you. I'm just curious from
our general manager's perspective, it seems to me like these
deals are extremely difficult to make period. But additionally, because
you really there are three parties involved because there's a
sign and trade effectively going on here, or a sign
right after the trade, so it's the two teams and
the player. So part of what the Packers are giving
(25:30):
up in this deal is signing Micah to a very
lucrative contract, but that contract has no value to the Cowboys. Similarly,
when the Cowboys are getting draft picks back by definition
by giving them Micah Parsons, they're devaluing those draft picks
because now they should be better. So there's some kind
of wonkiness in my opinion of like how you value
these things, which I imagine is why these are really tough
(25:52):
deals to make, because when the Green Bay Packers are saying, hey, listen,
part of what we're giving up here is this exceptionally
large contract, and the Cowboys say, well, that doesn't do
us any good and we're still looking for value elsewhere,
like how much does the does those things kind of
complicate these types of.
Speaker 3 (26:07):
Deals, Well, I wouldn't want to hear the other team
complaining because you know they're part of this trade and
they're they're trading for an all pro players, So you
have to give up something, and you better give up
a lot. But typically when there's draft picks involved, or
draft picks and players for the trade involved plus a contract,
you always want to hammer out the compensation as far
(26:27):
as what the trade parameters are going to be first.
I would never want to let the other team start
negotiating with the player first. They get that done, and
then now you start to lose some leverage because now
the player knows, hey, look, I got this deal done
with Green Bay for whatever. It's going to be forty
five million a year. We got to make this deal,
and they start losing a little bit of leverage. So
it was always, hey, let's get the parameters done first,
(26:47):
and we nail those down, okay, and have a verbal
agreement on that.
Speaker 2 (26:51):
Now you can talk to the agent.
Speaker 3 (26:54):
But you know, this is a it's a difficult deal
to do just because the contract is a contract. But
what's the right compensation. Going back to the Cowboys and
two first round draft picks and a and a proven player,
it sounds good, you know those two draft picks. You know,
best case scenario, you get you know, a starter, maybe
(27:15):
two starters, maybe you get a pro bowler, and you
get them for four years at below market prices. But
The reality of it is, the draft is it's a
little bit like lottery.
Speaker 2 (27:25):
Take us.
Speaker 3 (27:25):
Now, the higher you pick that you have a better chance.
But fifty five percent of players in the first round
sign a second contract with that club. Okay, very few
actually become All pros. So you're getting two first round
draft picks, but I'll tell you you'll hit on one.
And the Cowboys have drafted pretty well, so they have
a chance to get on both. Okay, but is one
(27:46):
of them going to be at a premier position and
an All Pro player?
Speaker 2 (27:49):
Well, that's hard to say.
Speaker 3 (27:52):
So you look at some of the trades in the
past of teams that decide, all right, we don't want
to pay this player, but we'll just draft as replacement. Well,
Tennessee's send Aj Brown to Philly, Okay, we'll just draft
Trailing Burks as his replacement in the first round. Didn't
work Okay, San Francisco is same thing with the Forrest Buckner.
We're gonna pay some other players, will trade him to
the Colts, and we'll draft his replacement. Javon Kinlaw didn't
(28:15):
work out, So you can't just guarantee that, Hey, we're
trading parsons, but we now we'll have two Pro Bowl
players to take his place. Maybe that happens, but the
odds say that's that's gonna be a little bit low. So,
like Skin said earlier, if this was done in March
and April, you just have more teams competing, more teams
are budget at that point, cash and cap wise to
(28:39):
do a deal, and then that kind of will increase
your compensation back because you'd have a lot of teams
competing for Micha Parsons. It wouldn't be just one. But
you do it now, it's just less people involved. When
there's less people involved, you can't get you lose some leverage,
you don't have as much coming back.
Speaker 1 (28:53):
Yeah, I couldn't agree with you more, Tom. I always
felt like you look at these deals and is is
this the best deal you can make or is the
best deal you can make right now? Or with some
other qualifiers. And when you're trading elite players, you never
want there to be a qualifier. You never want there
to be a drag on the value of the trade.
And you guys know more about the NFL in this
market than I do, but it just feels like there
(29:14):
was a drag here. Skin. My last question for you.
You kind of alluded to this earlier and for the
listeners to know Skin has like a PhD in the NBA,
So I'm going to link it back in here is
what is the state of the Dallas Fort Worth fan
base right now? Like, on the positive side, the Rangers
win the World Series in twenty twenty three, you got
Cooper Flag in the first round, but you've also lost
(29:35):
Micah Parsons and Luka Doncic. It seems like there's a
lot of highs and lows. There's a lot of heartbreak
mixed in there. When the dust settles, how are they feeling?
Speaker 4 (29:44):
I think right now the fan base is completely battered.
And I think, you know, the NFL is so crazy
because so much of it's going to come down to
injuries and what players get injured. I mean, I think
you know, with relatively good health, the Cowboys are going
to be in an eight or nine win team, and
with some bad health then you're looking at a five
or six win team, and that's not going to make
(30:05):
anybody in the fan base feel good. I think. I actually,
if you look at trading Luca and how lucky they
got with Cooper Flag, I actually really like the Mavericks
team if Kyrie Irving is healthy and Kyrie Irving ain't healthy,
so they don't have enough shooting and they don't have
enough playmaking. But they have a chance to be a
(30:28):
top three defensive team in the league. I wholeheartedly believe that.
I know the way Jason Kid coaches, and if he's
willing to put Anthony Davis and Derek Lively the second
and PJ. Washington Junior, who's their best primter defender, and
also six seven with long arms out there with Cooper Flag,
that is a dominant defensive team. But they don't have
enough shooting and they don't have enough playmaking for the
(30:50):
modern NBA. So I think the fan base is not
going to get to feel that because Kyrie's not coming
back until February, your March, and when he does come back,
maybe he's seventy five percent or eighty percent. I really
think if their health turns around, they got a chance
to be incredible next season, right But when you've been
(31:12):
watching Luka Doncic drag you to the finals, for a fan,
that's not going to feel good for them. The franchise
was saved with the Cooper Flag pick. I mean, I
just I was watching that lottery and man, because we
had dealt with so much. I mean, the Kyrie Irving
(31:32):
injury was devastating. You guys, know, when you have a
star and he gets hurt, it's devastating. And Kyrie literally
just put the team on his back and was doing
amazing things. And there's all this baggage that came with
Kyrie before he arrived. And let me just tell you, guys,
he has been wonderful. And I was from being from afar,
(31:54):
not knowing him personally, I was scared because of what
you read and what you see, I have not seen
any of that. He's been amazing to work with. He's
been a leader.
Speaker 2 (32:05):
You know.
Speaker 4 (32:05):
I think the Mavericks got the benefit of getting him
after he went through all of that hell and was
drugged through the media, mud and all that stuff in
Boston and Brooklyn. And I'm not absolving him of any
of his own doing, but it seems like he had
emerged from that in a wonderful place and then he
gets a pretty catastrophic injury. Right. And so if you
watched one half of Anthony Davis and Kyrie Irving together
(32:28):
when they played the Rockets, they looked like an elite team,
and then Anthony Davis gets hurt. So it's a long
way of saying that this fan base has been drugged
through the mud, the emotional mud, and I don't know
that they're gonna get the immediate dividends to pull him
out of it. I think that the fall and the
in January February time is going to be a lot
(32:51):
of hits to him, and it's gonna be the Cowboys
and the Mavericks happening at the same time. And who
knows what happens with the Rangers. Man, they got a
lot of injuries, and boy, the Bats didn't come to
get So it feels like a dark time for the
fan base who can never see the you know, past
the immediate problems. I think that things will turn around
(33:13):
with relative health, but it's going to be five or
six months down the road before anybody sees that, Hey.
Speaker 2 (33:19):
Coop Cooper flag this year.
Speaker 3 (33:21):
Okay, arch Manning next year, and we'll forget all about this,
that this all happened.
Speaker 4 (33:27):
I will be fine, Tom, Thank you for promising me
that I heard it right here on this podcast. Guaranteed
me that's gonna happen. But Yeah, that would be that
would be nice. And then you have this dragantic contract
with Dak and everyone yelling that they want the rookie
to play.
Speaker 3 (33:44):
Always got to look at the balance side.
Speaker 1 (33:47):
I think you've inspired us to do a show on
all the conspiracy theories around the draft lottery and frozen
enflopes and sticky sticky ping pong balls, because no franchise
needed the number one pick more than the Dallas man Well,
I want to thank you, guys, both the tremendous wisdom
of the general manager here from Tom, and the exceptional
(34:07):
passion and the knowledge of the fan base from you Skin.
Thank you guys for joining us. Please join me host
bad Levine, Ryan McDonough and other general managers every week
for Roster Syringes on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get
your podcasts.
Speaker 4 (34:24):
Welcome
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