One thing became abundantly clear during the Cowboys’ failed effort to keep linebacker Micah Parsons in Dallas.
Owner and G.M. Jerry Jones has zero regard, or respect, for the agents who represent his players.
It wasn’t a new development. But it was never more obvious than it was over the past several months, when Jones believed he had directly negotiated a new deal with Parsons, and when Jones expected Parsons to honor the terms of the supposed handshake deal.
From Jones’s feigned ignorance as to the name of Parsons’s agent to Jones’s repeated comments relegating the role of agent to bystander at best to the process of getting deals done, it was clear that Jones was violating the letter and spirit of the CBA, which delegates to certified representatives the exclusive right to negotiate with individual teams on behalf of the league’s many players — except when the player chooses to represent himself.
As the Parsons situation reached full boil, the NFL Players Association remained silent. In his first interview since becoming the NFLPA’s interim executive director, David White was asked about the union’s position on Jerry’s labor-practice proclivities.
“We intend to enforce every provision of the Collective Bargaining Agreement when we think that there may be a violation,” White told Rob Maaddi of the Associated Press. “And the best way to do that is to call people and say: ‘[Knock it off](https://x.com/RobMaaddi/status/1963246762908377184).’ When both sides are able to do that, when needed, that usually makes for a productive management-labor relationship. When it doesn’t work, for whatever reason, that’s when you take it to the next level, which is to file a grievance to go to court, or to take whatever action is available to you under the \[CBA\].”
The response suggests that the NFLPA told Jones and the Cowboys to, in White’s words, “Knock it off.” And while the situation ended with Parsons being traded before Jerry could try (again) to work things out directly with Parsons, it was clear during last Thursday night’s press conference that Jones fully intends to keep negotiating directly with players.
Here’s the problem: The current CBA is toothless when it comes to punishing owners who try to cut the agent out of the process. The punishment for the first offense is no punishment at all. For each and every violation after that, it’s the same five-figure fine. (Currently, $62,000.)
Players are routinely subjected to progressive discipline. The goal is to increase the consequences in order to incentivize compliance. That concept hasn’t been applied to the NFL’s teams, when it comes to this specific infraction.
So, yeah, he’ll keep doing it. And if/when the NFLPA files a grievance, he’ll write the check and keep doing what he does.
That won’t change until the CBA does.