FRISCO, Texas — (AP) — Jerry Jones says the Dallas Cowboys are still in win-now mode, despite the decision to trade star edge rusher Micah Parsons to Green Bay for two first-round draft picks and Kenny Clark, an aging defensive tackle whose production declined last season.
The team's owner and general manager and his son, executive vice president of personnel Stephen Jones, even suggested Thursday night —a few hours after the sides agreed on the trade — that the Cowboys might use one of those future first-rounders in another deal to boost those win-now hopes.
“Kenny Clark was a big part of this, and that was a part of winning right now,” Stephen Jones said. “And we feel like when you look at the frustration is, we hadn’t been able to win the big game in the playoffs. And we think it is a direct connection to not being able to stop the run. And we think Kenny Clark can be a big piece to that.”
The Cowboys missed the playoffs in what ended up being Parsons' final season with the team that drafted him 12th overall in 2021. Part of the reason was the hamstring injury that sidelined quarterback Dak Prescott half the season.
Dallas reached the playoffs each of the previous three years, but finished 1-3 and allowed an average of 142 yards rushing in the losses. Parsons had his only sack in the only win.
The Dallas defense finished 28th overall and 29th against the run last season, and Jerry Jones said discussions about the possibility of trading Parsons went all the way back to the spring. That was also when Jerry Jones said he made a contract offer directly to the 2021 AP NFL Defensive Rookie of the Year.
Parsons wanted his agent to be part of the discussions, and the sides never made any meaningful progress on a deal over the past several months, including after the 26-year-old reported to training camp but never practiced while waiting on a long-term deal.
“This trade was not just thought about today,” Jerry Jones said during a news conference at the team's headquarters. “This trade has been going on in our mind and our strategies and being talked about, it’s been going on all spring. It culminated today, and it came quick. But that’s the way things go. It does happen fast when it happens.”
Parsons publicly requested a trade Aug. 1, and Jerry Jones said a day later that wouldn't happen. He acknowledged with a smirk he was being less than truthful, not long after detailing that the club targeted defensive tackles while pondering a Parsons trade.
“Do you really think if I wanted someone to be interested in him that I would say, ‘Oh, I’m going to trade him,'” Jones said. “It's the opposite. Of course. And I thank you for writing it.”
Parsons' relationship with the club seemed to deteriorate, to the point that he made a spectacle of himself in the preseason finale last week by appearing on the sidelines without his number showing, and by lying on a training table behind the bench while the game was going on.
Asked if there was a ever a sense that Parsons really didn't want to be with the Cowboys anymore, Stephen Jones said, “I never felt it.”
“Micah knows that I care about him. But more important than that I didn't give it a thought, it didn't change one thing,” Jerry Jones said of the apparently disgruntled Parsons. “Don't make so much out of that, that not talking caused this thing to be done.”
Clark, who turns 30 on Oct. 4, is a three-time Pro Bowler coming off a 2024 season in which he recorded just one sack and four tackles for loss. He played much of 2024 in pain after injuring his right foot in the Packers’ season-opening loss to Philadelphia in Brazil. Clark said during camp he was feeling better after offseason surgery.
Clark could end up taking playing time away from Mazi Smith, who has been a disappointment as the Cowboys' 2023 first-round pick.
Sam Williams and Marshawn Kneeland, two promising young players, are the likely starters at defensive end with Parsons gone, and Dallas is high on rookie second-round pick Donovan Ezeiruaku.
“Things are good here,” Jerry Jones said. “We have just decided that it was in the best interest of our team to take the consideration that we have. We appreciate (Parsons') four years. But we can take that consideration and win, in our minds, more.”
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AP Sports Writer Steve Megargee contributed.
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