Late in the fourth quarter of Monday’s 10-7 win by the Eagles over the Packers, Philadelphia faced a second and seven from its own 44. Running back Saquon Barkley got the handoff, with a chance to break free.
Enter Packers linebacker Micah Parsons. More specifically, enter his leg. Parsons tripped Barkley, causing him to fall down short of the line to gain.
Parsons was not penalized. He was, however, fined $12,172 by the league office. No flag was thrown.
Barkley gained five yards on the next snap, giving the Eagles a fresh set of downs. But the Eagles should have gotten 15 yards of field position, which would have come with a first and 10 from Green Bay’s 35.
The drive eventually sputtered on the Green Bay 35, on a fourth-and-six play that saw the Eagles take a shot at the end zone. When it failed, the Packers received one last chance to win the game in regulation or to force overtime, with 27 seconds to play.
When the Packers traded quarterback Brett Favre to the Jets in 2008, Green Bay included a poison pill aimed at preventing the Jets from re-trading him to another team in the NFC North. The Packers had a similar term foisted on them in the trade that brought Micah Parsons from the Cowboys to Green Bay.
Via Adam Schefter of ESPN.com, the Packers will owe the Cowboys a first-round pick in 2028 if the Packers trade Parsons to a team in the NFC East.
The Eagles made a big push for Parsons. The Cowboys refused to trade him to a division rival.
The Parsons also included a poison pill for the other player in the transaction. If the Cowboys trade defensive tackle Kenny Clark to another team in the NFC North, Dallas will owe Green Bay a 2028 first-round pick.
In the Favre trade, the cost of a re-trade was three first-round picks. The Jets cut Favre after one year, and he signed with the Vikings.
Plenty of teams have an aversion to their players ending up with division rivals. Which is fine, unless that causes them to get less value for their assets. Other teams simply want the best deal they can get, regardless of where the player goes.
Packers wide receiver Matthew Golden (shoulder) was downgraded to non-participation in Friday’s practice.
Golden was limited on Thursday.
Cornerback Nate Hobbs (knee) and defensive lineman Luke Van Ness (foot) remained out of practice.
Edge rusher Micah Parsons (pectoral) was among nine players who remained limited for a second consecutive day.
Offensive guard Aaron Banks (neck), linebacker Edgerrin Cooper (foot), running back Josh Jacobs (rest), offensive lineman Zach Tom (back), linebacker Quay Walker (calf), wide receiver Christian Watson (knee), wide receiver Dontayvion Wicks (calf) and defensive lineman Colby Wooden (shoulder) also were limited again.
The Packers added backup quarterback Malik Willis (calf) and wide receiver Malik Heath (hip) to the injury report as limited participants.
Wide receiver Savion Williams (foot) returned to limited work after missing Thursday’s session.
Micah Parsons is gone from the Cowboys, but the hard feelings linger.
Months of acrimony resulted in an August 28 trade to the Packers. Since then, owner and G.M. Jerry Jones has largely played defense by explaining in various ways the decision to trade away one of the best defensive players in football. At a time when his team’s defense is now among the worst in the sport.
On Monday, eight days after Parsons publicly complained about the team’s treatment of cornerback Trevon Diggs, Jones tried a new argument. Basically, Jones suggested that Parsons isn’t worthy of the money he wanted.
The question from Stephen A. Smith of SiriusXM to Jones focused broadly on whether Jones looks in players now for traits displayed by former greats like Michael Irvin and DeMarcus Ware, and whether Jones sees it in his current players. In his response, Jones went straight to the moment when Parsons laid on a training table during a preseason game in which he wasn’t playing due to his contract dispute.
“Not one time, not even in the hottest of days and two-a-days in August in Texas, between eleven in the morning or when they quit practicing or four in the afternoon, did I never see any one of these two go over and lay on a damn training table in front of a million people,” Jones said. “Never. It’s not in their makeup. . . . It’s just not in their makeup. . . .
“And you’d like to think if you’re going to be [paying] the highest that’s ever been paid for something in football, you could get that. And when you don’t have it and you pay the highest that’s ever been in football, you really got a problem.”
It’s a weak argument, frankly. Parsons — who played without hesitation in 2024 for well below market value even though he was eligible for a new deal — was using the tools available to him to get the contract his performance has earned. Jones was trying to squeeze Parsons to honor the terms of a supposed handshake deal that Jones tried to do behind the back of Parsons’s agent.
If Irvin or Ware or any other highly-skilled Cowboys player of yesteryear were in the same position Parsons was in, what would they have done? Gladly accepted an offer that didn’t reflect their value, or taken a stand?
When Michael Irvin played, players had little or no leverage. Now, they do. Now, players are willing to fight for what they deserve.
The entire situation happened because Jones wanted to lowball Parsons, and because Jones got upset when Parsons didn’t respond to mistreatment with gratitude. Taking a clumsy shot at Parsons’s character is just the latest ploy in Jones’s misguided P.R. effort aimed at making the fans see it his way before lining up behind the billionaires.
As they all too often do.
Two weeks ago, Packers linebacker Micah Parsons had a career-high three sacks against the Cardinals. On Sunday against the Panthers, he had a career low.
Via the NFL’s NextGenStats, Parsons had 21 pass rushes and zero pressures. It was Parsons’s first career game without a single pressure. He was double-teamed on six of his pass rushes.
On one hand, it was not a great game from Parsons. On the other hand, the Panthers deserve credit for having a plan for neutralizing him.
It propelled the Panthers to their first win at Lambeau Field since 2008 — and more importantly a 5-4 record through nine games. Next up, the face the Saints and the Falcons before an intriguing Monday night showdown with the 49ers.
The Packers traded a pair of first-round picks and other assets to Dallas because they thought Micah Parsons would be a difference maker on their defense and that’s exactly what he proved to be in October.
Parsons helped Green Bay to a 3-0 record in October by recording nine tackles, four sacks, five tackles for loss, and six quarterback hits. Three of those sacks came in a Week 7 win over the Cardinals and Parsons added another one in last Sunday night’s win over the Steelers.
The effort was recognized by the NFL on Wednesday. The league named Parsons the NFC’s defensive player of the month.
It’s the second time Parsons has taken that prize. The first came while he was with the Cowboys and the Packers will be looking for more of the same for the rest of his time with the team.
The animosity between the Cowboys and linebacker Micah Parson lingers, nearly two months to the day after Dallas traded him to Green Bay.
The latest flash point relates to Cowboys cornerback Trevon Diggs, who was placed on injured reserve over the weekend.
“Honestly, I feel like they fucked my dog over, you know what I mean?” Parsons told Jori Epstein of Yahoo Sports after Sunday night’s win over the Steelers. “He’s coming off a catastrophic knee injury and I just didn’t think they did right by him. He didn’t participate all camp and he’s going out there playing Week 1 and 2. I just don’t think you do that to a player like that. . . .
“And the type of knee injury he had, they forced him out there. He has no reps really. He’s telling me he was in warmup phase during Week 1. Even with the ramp-up, I just feel like you just don’t do that.”
Diggs suffered a concussion at home before the Week 7 win over the Commanders. He missed that game before landing on IR before Week 8.
“I just feel like they screwed him over,” Parsons said. “The organization let him down. You know what I mean? You just don’t do that to a player. And I just think it was mad wrong and I just pray for him.”
The Cowboys declined to respond to Parsons, via Epstein. Diggs’s contract is not guaranteed beyond 2025; he has a $14.5 million base salary in 2026.
Micah Parsons had his best performance with the Packers in Sunday’s win over the Cardinals.
Now Parsons has been named NFC defensive player of the week for the first time with Green Bay.
Parsons had five total tackles with four tackles for loss and a career-high 3.0 sacks in the Packers’ 27-23 victory.
This is Parsons’ fourth career player of the week award — his first since Week 2 of the 2023 season. He also won it in Week 8 of 2021 and Week 5 of 2022.
So far this season, Parsons has recorded 5.5 sacks with five tackles for loss and 13 QB hits.
Micah Parsons entered Sunday’s game with 55 career sacks in 69 career regular-season games. The Packers edge rusher had never had more than 2.5 sacks in a game.
He accomplished that against the Cardinals, sacking Jacoby Brissett three times.
“When it’s time to win the game, something just switches,” Parsons said, via Wes Hodkiewicz of the team website. “I don’t think it was my best pass-rush game. I just think it’s the first time [opponents] allowed me to rush this year. I mean if you look at the looks I’ve been getting, double tight ends, chips, full slides, and then also just other guys stepping up.”
The Cardinals put left tackle Paris Johnson on an island with Parsons. It was a mistake.
Parsons’ three sacks put him in elite company: Only 19 other Packers pass rushers have had three sacks in a game since they became an official stat in 1982. Parsons had six pressures, four in the fourth quarter, according to ESPN Research, and he leads the NFL with 15 fourth-quarter pressures.
“For me, I don’t rush with a plan,” Parsons said, via Matt Schneidman of TheAthletic.com. “I just rush to go. Like I told y’all, I just know go and I just know full speed and I don’t really say, this is what I’m gonna do. I just kinda attack him how he attacks me and I just was attacking today.”
Parsons would have had a fourth sack if not for officials calling a rare penalty for a hip-drop tackle after chasing down Brissett. He said he could have done nothing differently.
“That’s just an effort play,” Parsons said. “I’m rushing, that guy, he’s about my size at quarterback and I just did what I thought. . . . I did not intentionally hip drop. I just pray I don’t got the fine in my locker when I come in on Tuesday or Monday.”
Last Thursday night, Packers linebacker Micah Parsons added his voice to the tush push debate with a tweet posted during the Giants-Eagles game.
“It’s not football!” Parsons tweeted.
This Thursday, Parsons met with reporters. He elaborated on his views regarding the controversial play.
“You ask the Eagles offensive players, probably say that’s the best thing we’re doing on offense right now,” Parsons said, via Matt Schneidman of TheAthletic.com. “It’s the most consistent thing they got, but that might come and bite me one day. It is what it is. I hate that play . . . you can’t stop it if they’re leaving early.”
The day it could bite him could be Monday, November 10. Packers at Eagles. The Eagles will surely try to use his comments about the inconsistency of the offense as motivation.
Even if they’re accurate.
He’s also accurate about the fact that the Eagles players leave early and it’s not called. As explained earlier today, the league office’s apparent decision to instruct referee Craig Wrolstad to drop a flag on the uncalled illegal motion by Lions quarterback Jared Goff raises the obvious question of why the league office doesn’t do the same thing when one or more Eagles’ offensive lineman commit false starts on tush push plays.
