On Micah Parsons, Jerry Jones wants to ignore the CBA

NBC Sports

02-04-2025

History has a way of repeating itself. Especially when it comes to the team with a 30-year history of not competing for a Super Bowl win.
Cowboys owner Jerry Jones expressed on Tuesday a desire to negotiate a new Micah Parsons contract directly with the player, without dealing with his agent, David Mulugheta. Jerry has done it before.
During Ezekiel Elliott's holdout in 2019, Jones made it clear that he prefers cutting out the middleman.
"[T]hat's always been the issue with me and my approach to managing the Cowboys,' Jones said in 2019. 'When you cut out the people in between the money and the player, we all know that agents, attorneys have their agenda. By the way, they are all taking money out of the pie too when they're there. The straighter it goes from the source to the one receiving it, nine times out of 10 that's more efficient.'
The NFL Players Association looked into the issue at the time. It's unclear whether anything was done. If it was, it didn't take.
This time around, Jones has been even more strident when it comes to his desire to sidestep the agent and negotiate with the player. Among other things, Jones openly disrespected Mulugheta by saying he doesn't even know his name.
Regardless, the Collective Bargaining Agreement requires Jones and the Cowboys to deal with Parsons's NFLPA-certified agent. Whenever a player asks a team to negotiate contract terms with his representative, the team must comply with that request. That's because the NFLPA is the ultimate bargaining entity on behalf of the players, and the union has delegated those responsibilities to contract advisors for individual contract negotiations.
Cutting out the agent means cutting out the union. Which violates the CBA.
The NFLPA currently has no comment on Jones's latest attempt to sidestep the agent and do a deal with the player. And the union might not need to do anything, because Parsons knows what Jones is trying to do.
'David is the best and I will not be doing any deal without [David Mulugheta] involved!' Parsons said on Twitter. 'Like anyone with good sense I hired experts for a reason. There is no one I trust more when it comes to negotiating contracts than David! There will be no backdoors in this contract negotiation.'
Parsons couldn't make it any more clear than that. Which means that if Jones doesn't know Mulugheta's name, he'd better learn it. Fast. No deal is getting done for Parsons until Jones engages David Mulugheta.
To his credit, Mulugheta has taken the high road.
'I agree with Jerry—it's never been about me,' Mulugheta told PFT via text message on Wednesday morning. 'The only person that matters here is Micah, and, at the end of the day, our goal is for Micah to be able to do for generations of Parsons what Jerry has done for generations of Jones.'
Jones earned his generational wealth in part by doing good deals. He hopes to do even better deals by dealing directly with someone who isn't an expert in negotiating NFL player contracts. It's been part of his modus operandi.
It hasn't worked in the past. As to Parsons, it won't be working in the present.