We may have just seem the apex moment in the history of notes mode — the rambling, 4-pager from Dallas Cowboys superstar Micah Parsons in which he spread blame to everyone but himself and ultimately requested a trade from the team he’s played for since they selected him in the first round of the 2021 NFL draft.
Parsons simply wrote “Thank You Dallas” on his post before launching into his account of the last few years of contract negotiations between himself, the Cowboys, his agent, David Mulugheta, team owner Jerry Jones and Cowboys COO Stephen Jones.
This particular journey into the mind of Parsons, arguably the NFL’s best defensive player, is a wild ride.
Trying to Decipher Parsons’ Message to Fans
The most important words of Parsons’ post were the last ones.
“I have made a tough decision,” Parsons wrote. “I no longer want to play for the Dallas Cowboys. My trade request has been submitted to Stephen Jones personally.”
It’s what happened before that which takes a little more to untangle.
According to Parsons, he told Mulugheta after the 2023 season, Parsons’ third year, that he wanted to explore signing a new contract extension and the Cowboys told Mulugheta they weren’t open to it at that point. Instead, they exercised the fifth year option on Parsons’ contract that will pay him approximately $24 million in 2025.
Parsons played in 2024 but had the worst year of his career to this point with career lows in games (13), sacks (12.0), tackles (43), TFL (12) and QB hits (23). He’s also watched as a pair of players considered his equals signed deals for at least $40 million per year with Pittsburgh Steelers edge rusher T.J. Watt and Dallas Cowboys edge rusher Myles Garrett.
This is where things get confusing.
According to Parsons, he told Mulugheta twice after the 2024 regular season concluded to approach the Cowboys regarding a contract extension and both times Mulugheta told his his client to wait until the deals with Watt and Garrett were done in order to drive the price up. According to Parsons, both times he told Mulugheta he didn’t care about being the highest paid edge rusher and just wanted to get the deal done.
What’s not clear is if Mulugheta ever actually reached out to the Cowboys — possibly in 2023 but it seems not at all after 2024.
Either way, in Parsons’ version, there was no contact between the 2 sides until he met 1 on 1 with Jerry Jones in March and the 2 discussed the contract and its terms. Jones came away thinking they’d reached an agreement on the money — without Mulugheta present.
When Mulugheta reached out to the team following the meeting he was told a deal was already in place and balked, telling the Cowboys there was absolutely no deal in place.
“Yes I engaged in a back and forth in regards to what I wanted from my contract,” Parsons wrote. “But at no point did I believe this was supposed to be a formal negotiation and I informed Mr. Jones afterward my agent would reach out thinking this would get things done.”
