Cowboys executive rips narrative about contract extensions amid Micah Parsons stalemate

As of the morning of July 30, there was no indication that the Dallas Cowboys and star pass-rusher Micah Parsons were close to coming to terms on a lucrative contract extension. 

During a Tuesday appearance on Dallas sports radio station 105.3 The Fan, Cowboys executive vice president Stephen Jones hit back at the narrative that the club waits too long to lock key players down via multiyear deals. 

"We don't agree on that," Jones explained, as shared by Grant Gordon of the NFL's website. "We don't drag deals out. We do deals when there's an opportunity to do a deal. Certainly, no one knows what goes on internally with a particular negotiation. Sometimes players and agents aren't ready to pull the trigger until they see other cards played."

Cowboys starting quarterback Dak Prescott may or may not have taken a shot at team ownership when he said during the first week of training camp that Dallas players being involved in contract stalemates is "an each and every year conversation." Most recently, wide receiver CeeDee Lamb didn't receive his four-year, $136M deal until late August 2024. Weeks later, fans learned hours before Dallas' regular-season opener on Sept. 8 that Prescott had agreed to a four-year extension.

It's widely believed that Parsons wants to become the new highest-paid non-quarterback in the NFL after T.J. Watt of the Pittsburgh Steelers reset the market when he agreed to a three-year, $123M extension that included $108M guaranteed ahead of training camp. For a piece published on Wednesday morning, The Athletic's Jon Machota noted that "the Cowboys have shown a history of eventually getting something done with all of their top players." 

It doesn't sound like the Jones family is losing sleep over the Parsons saga heading into August. 

"What we're not going to do is go out and do something that's not responsible in terms of just in the name of getting a deal done one month earlier, go do it and pay the guy another $5M of your cap space," Jones added during his comments. "Especially when you're dealing, in our particular case, internally with guys who are homegrown here and we feel like they want to be here. I felt like Dak wanted to be here. I always felt like CeeDee wanted to be here."

Parsons is in the final year of his rookie deal, and it's unclear if he'd be willing to forfeit money by missing regular-season games amid his desire for long-term financial security. For now, it appears Parsons could spend at least a portion of August waiting to see if the Cowboys will match his asking price.