Mike Florio ,
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Cowboys owner Jerry Jones has made a largely nonsensical comparison of the Micah Parsons contract impasse to a kid trying to play mommy against daddy to get what he wants.
The metaphor applies more logically in a related context. A kid who is misbehaving will keep doing it, as long as mommy and daddy let it happen.
Jones has repeatedly tried to negotiate contracts directly with players, even when players are represented by certified agents. He does it because the NFL and the NFL Players Association allow him to do it.
Jerry has been doing it for years. He makes no bones about it. And with no one ever telling him not to do it, he’s only becoming more brazen.
What business owner wouldn’t want to negotiate directly with someone who has no expertise or experience in negotiation? Jones, like many of his ilk, wants to be able to do whatever he wants to do, without anyone else getting in the way. No restriction. No limitation. No regulation. No litigation.
He wants to bamboozle a player who may not even realize a negotiation is happening and then print it up and have the agent and the player sign it. In Jones’s mind, the agent is a bystander. And that’s baloney.
The league should have told him to stop doing it, long ago. The union should have filed a grievance over it, long ago.
If the NFLPA wants to re-establish credibility with the rank and file, one way to do that would be to stand up to Jones and submit the appropriate paperwork challenging his effort to get Parsons to finalize a contract that his certified agent didn’t negotiate.
And if the NFL truly cares about the integrity of the game and everything associated with it, the league will tell Jones to stop doing it before the union files — and wins — a grievance regarding his disregard for the Collective Bargaining Agreement.
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