Twenty-four hours later, the entire sports world is still coming to terms with Thursday afternoon’s seismic preseason trade that sent two-time All-Pro linebacker Micah Parsons from the Dallas Cowboys to the Green Bay Packers. That includes the crew on ESPN’s mid-morning show First Take, where newly re-signed contributor and former NFL MVP Cam Newton went […]
Twenty-four hours later, the entire sports world is still coming to terms with Thursday afternoon’s seismic preseason trade that sent two-time All-Pro linebacker Micah Parsons from the Dallas Cowboys to the Green Bay Packers.
That includes the crew on ESPN’s mid-morning show First Take, where newly re-signed contributor and former NFL MVP Cam Newton went against the grain and boldly declared Dallas owner Jerry Jones and the Cowboys as the winner of the trade.
The Packers traded their next two first-round picks in the 2026 and 2027 NFL Drafts in addition to three-time Pro Bowl DT Kenny Clark to the Cowboys to acquire Parsons, who is expected to sign an eye-popping four-year, $188 million deal that will make him the NFL’s highest-paid non-quarterback with an average salary of $47 million annually.
“Yes, (Dallas) won the trade. Remove emotions, what I’m saying is this: in order to be good in this league of the NFL, you need one thing, and that’s talent. That’s not to say that Micah Parsons isn’t talented. But what I am saying is, if you do not have talent, what next do you need is acquisition ability to get talent. And that’s what Jerry Jones did,” Newton said Friday morning on First Take. “He has potentially four picks in the first round alone (over the next two drafts) as of today. We don’t know what Kenny Clark is going to be. (But Jerry Jones) has made it abundantly clear, and said this: We want to stop the run. And, as great a player as Micah Parsons is, he’s an edge rusher. If you know any type of defense in this league, the first thing they want to stop is the run (to) make the offense one-dimensional. All these things are formulas the Dallas Cowboys have said and implemented to insert moving forward.”
What the Dallas Cowboys got in return from Green Bay Packers
Effectively, while Parsons will undoubtedly transform Green Bay’s defense having recorded at least 12 sacks each of his first four seasons in the league, Newton believes Jones and the Cowboys will win the deal in the longterm with their ability to add multiple players that are more suited to Dallas’ desire to become a more line-of-scrimmage team.
Clark, the Packers’ 2016 first-round pick (No. 27 overall) out of UCLA, has made the Pro Bowl three times (2019, 2021, 2023) across his nine seasons in Green Bay. While he had a bit of a down year stat-wise in 2024, Clark has been among the Packers most reliable defenders and a stout playmaker in the middle of their defense for the better part of the last decade.
That includes registering a career-high 7.5 sacks, two forced fumbles and three passes defended in 2023, the second of three straight seasons in which Clark started atleast 18 games, including all 17 in the regular-season. Clark has 35 career sacks, seven forced fumbles, eight fumble returns and 417 total tackles in nine years in Green Bay.
Parsons, meanwhile, provides the Packers far more pass rush potential off the edge, registering at least 12 sacks each of his first four NFL seasons after being selected by the Cowboys as the No. 12 overall pick in the 2021 NFL Draft out of Penn State. Parsons has 52.5 career sacks, 63 tackles for loss, nine forced fumbles, four fumble returns and 256 total tackles in four years in Dallas.
Category: Football
