The Dallas Cowboys traded Micah Parsons to the Green Bay Packers last week. We are not here to talk about that. Parsons is gone and will come up repeatedly in Week 4 when the Packers prepare to visit AT&T Stadium for the first time since authoring arguably the worst playoff loss in the Jerry Jones era from an embarrassment standpoint.
But obviously everything with the Cowboys right now is contextually tied to the trade so it is relevant. Tuesday marked the first day back at work for some folks, with Labor Day being on Monday, which meant that the flame was re-lit.
David Mulugheta, Parsons’ agent, went on First Take to have his day in court (so to speak). This happened just a few hours after ESPN launched a massive piece that featured work from Don Van Natta Jr., Seth Wickersham, Jeremy Fowler, Todd Archer (Cowboys) and Rob Demovsky (Packers). The Avengers assembled.
The whole thing is worth a read, but it focuses largely on the Parsons part of this saga for obvious reasons. Something stands out though as it relates to the other player involved in the trade, the one the Cowboys received in defensive tackle Kenny Clark.
Clark, a staple of the Packers defense since entering the league in 2016, was hardly a throw-in. His contract was attractive — Green Bay had already paid him the bulk of his 2025 deal, so the Cowboys would pay him just $2 million this season, and $20 million unguaranteed next season. A two-year, $22 million deal for a high-level player was viewed as a win for a Dallas team that sees the 29-year-old Clark as a multiyear solution, and there would also be no dead money if the Cowboys chose to release him after the season.
“From our perspective, it had to include Kenny Clark,” a source close to Jones said. “The only way it worked for us, we need something that helps us now and helps us in the future.”
Kenny Clark is a good player and is going to help the Cowboys. He deserves support and shouldn’t be lumped in with this whole thing in any kind of negative context.
Read that bit again, though. Doesn’t it kind of contradict itself? Clark is heralded as someone who is a very good player, but regarded as having an attractive contract. He is referred to as high-level and someone who can be a “multiyear solution”, and within that same sentence it is said that there would be no dead money if the Cowboys moved on from him after 2025.
What?
The Cowboys could certainly re-work Clark’s deal and maybe that is what this implies. Perhaps Dallas will negotiate a new one with him after 2025 that works for everyone involved. But in the interest of leverage since we have talked about that in an exhaustive sense, wouldn’t that be giving Clark an enormous amount?
How and why would the Cowboys be hyping this entire thing up as being about the future for their team, there is obviously no doubt that having multiple first-round picks come their way as a part of the trade are the crux of that argument, relative to Clark specifically when they are talking about maybe cutting him in the spring? Those things cannot co-exist.
There is a long, very long, way to go until this trade is proven to have been worth it or proper on either end. But that a week hasn’t even passed yet, and that the most intensive reporting on the matter includes a tip that Dallas could move on in the offseason is certainly weird. How is that a part of any future?
0 CommentsSee More:
