OXNARD, Calif. – Here is the tale of two player contracts, both having huge similarities as of Saturday, July 26.
First, both players were under contract for the 2025 season.
Both were in the final years of their contracts.
One is guaranteed for $24 million, paid out 1/18th each week of the NFL regular season, but currently counting that huge sum over the Cowboys' salary cap for this year.
The other was nonguaranteed for a $3.4 million base salary paid out 1/18th over each week of the season and counting a skosh more than $3.5 million against the cap, including the final portion of the prorated signing bonus.
But by Sunday morning, presumably extending at least until Sept. 3, the day before the Cowboys' season opens against Philadelphia on a Thursday night, when common sense economics usually prevails, that is where the similarities came to a screeching halt.
Because potentially by the end of today, Cowboys tight end Jake Ferguson is able to stuff a $12 million signing bonus into the financial account of his choice, head coach Brian Schottenheimer jokingly chiding his fourth-year tight end that he now can afford the payment for that engagement ring purchased for his "sweetie." He signs a four-year extension for $52 million.
The other, Cowboys four-time Pro Bowl defensive end Micah Parsons, is playing the predictable waiting game while conducting that newly fashioned "hold-in." Meaning he's here in body but not in soul, figuring withholding services is his only leverage for potentially snagging a larger salary package made up of base salaries, signing bonus and percentage of guarantees.
Parsons has yet to deposit a dime in any sort of interest-bearing account.
Now, I'm no certified public account. Never would have passed accounting in college, though I'm good with numbers, but would have been pretty solid when it would have come to Intro To Logic.
Let's analyze.
As for Ferguson, he could have waited until next year. Could have forced the Cowboys hand in 2026 to sign him to a new contract prior to the start of free agency. Or he could have taken his chances in free agency to see if another team would outbid the Cowboys for his services.
But that route comes with risk. A lot of risk. He would have to bet on himself that he has a big year in 2025 to help market his services in 2026 free agency. But what if he didn't and his market value plummeted? Or what if he suffered some sort of season-ending injury needing to be surgically repaired and headed into free agency next year with little marketing value.
Sort of like trying to sell a house with foundation problems.
Or maybe he was informed of that thin ice Dak Prescott tip-toed on in 2020 when he was eligible to be a free agent. And when the new contract wasn't completed in time, the Cowboys chose to secure his rights with the one-year, guaranteed $31.4 million franchise tag. And when a long-term deal was not completed by mid-July, Dak decided to play the season on the one-year franchise tag, betting on himself.
Dak almost busted.
Five games into the season, Dak suffered that gruesome, compound fracture to his lower leg and ankle ligament tear, immediately leaving the stadium for the operating table that night. Done for the season and was that close to potentially suffering a career-ruining injury, which would have caused the future long-term, multi-million deal to go right down the drain.
He was fortunate. Surgery was a success. Prognosis was good. The Cowboys resigned him to a four-year, $160 million deal in 2021, complete with a $66 million signing bonus and $140 million of the package guaranteed. He won the bet. Barely. But did tight-rope a financial high wire.
As for Ferguson, instead of risking that chance, he chose the bird in hand the Cowboys afforded him, signing the four-year extension, giving him the guaranteed $30 million of financial security.
Now Parsons. And let's reiterate, the guy with double-digit sacks over the first four year of his career is under contract this 2025 season for that guaranteed $24 million. And while numbers have not been publicly divulged, the Cowboys are standing pat on toeing the line for salary cap purposes, knowing cap charges for Dak, CeeDee Lamb, Trevon Diggs and Terence Steele are approaching nearly $100 million of the $279 million NFL cap. And next year, those four cap hits will balloon to $148 million, while adding in Osa Odighizuwa for $20.7 million and right now Tyler Smith for another $21.2 million after picking up his fifth-year option. That's now $190 million for six players.
(Note the Cowboys would like to sign Smith and DaRon Bland to extensions at some point this year.)
So it seems here on July 28 that both sides are at a negotiating stalemate, the Cowboys not giving in to whatever Parsons and his agent Davis Mulugheta are asking for, and Parsons and his camp not conceding a penny to the deal the Cowboys thought they had.
Of course, the Cowboys aren't saying much about where the negotiations stand. They also aren't mincing words when given the chance. When co-owner Stephen Jones was asked about Ferguson getting his deal done a year ahead of time, he said, "We pay players who want to get paid."
He'd also added when asked about Parsons' deal, "He's got to want to get paid."
No need to even read between those lines. Might as well be 16-point type.
And while Parsons is here in camp, he is not practicing. Watching on the field again on Monday, yes. Maybe there is such a thing as a "soft" hold-in, certainly not wanting to risk injury that would hamper his negotiating leverage.
All the Cowboys know is Parsons is under contract. And guarantee he plays on the fifth-year option, thinking he will get more next year on an extension, but if the two sides can't come to an agreement again, the Cowboys can slap the franchise tag on him to hold his rights for like a guaranteed $28 million. Rolling the dice in consecutive years would be bold.
Hey, money is money, at least you'd think. Early multi-year guarantees would seem to outweigh a larger pie. See Jake Ferguson. And we aren't talking about gambling on a $20 minimum wager at the Blackjack table. Not even doubling down when the cards are in your favor.
We are talking gambling on a generational amount of money.
And in the end, over all my years covering this team, no player engaged in a contract holdout has ever missed an entire season. Well, except one. In 1985, the Cowboys drafted Matt Darwin, a center/guard out of Texas A&M, in the fifth round. He and his agent thought he deserved more than the $55 million signing bonus the Cowboys were offering. He ended up sitting out the entire season, re-entering the draft in 1986, going in the fourth round to the Eagles and having a solid five-year career.
Sure, Emmitt Smith missed the first two games in 1993. Sure, former linebacker Darrin Smith skipped the first seven games of the 16-game season in a contract dispute, playing just the nine games needed to accrue a year of service for that year.
Other than those two, can't remember any player in a contract holdout skipping an entire season with the Cowboys.
Or as the contract holdout parable my esteemed colleague at the Dallas Times Herald Frank Luka coined, he compared a player's holdout with cats stuck up in a tree. He would always ask, Did you ever find a dead cat in a tree? They always come down. And players in the end always get signed.
Sometimes it just takes time.
Sometimes the risk of losing a paycheck becomes too much to stomach.
