In landing Micah Parsons, Brian Gutekunst finally made good on his promise

The Packers paid handsomely to acquire Micah Parsons, but the Cowboys still didn't get enough in return for the All-Pro pass rusher.

Green Bay Packers general manager Brian Gutekunst has long said that he wants his team involved in the discussions for any available star player. For the majority of his tenure, those talks yielded little more than headlines and seemingly empty rhetoric.

"I can't talk about any players on any other teams," Gutekunst said earlier this week. "But I think, again, every opportunity that's out there that we think can help the Packers, we're going to take a long look at. If that opportunity makes sense to us, we'll do it."

That changed Thursday night when the Packers consummated one of the biggest trades in NFL history, landing superstar pass rusher Micah Parsons from the Dallas Cowboys in exchange for two first-round picks and veteran defensive tackle Kenny Clark. As part of the deal, Parsons will sign a four-year, $188 million deal that includes $136 million in guaranteed money, making him the highest-paid non-quarterback in NFL history.

The move represents a significant power shift in the NFC. Parsons immediately becomes the team's best player, one on a Hall of Fame trajectory who just turned 26 in May. His production over his four-year career has few peers. In league history, only he and the late Reggie White managed to record at least 12 sacks in each of their first four seasons. No other NFC contender has a pass rusher with such a pedigree and runway.

Just as importantly, the acquisition of Parsons also upends the very identity of the Green Bay franchise. Since the end of the Aaron Rodgers era, the team has leaned so heavily on youth as a means to rebuild its foundation. In 2024, they became the second youngest team to make the playoffs in over four decades. The only team ahead of them? The 2023 Packers.

While that approach has paid dividends, it does warrant some critiques as well. Gutekunst's roster featured almost no holes, plenty of depth, and a bevy of high-quality players. However, it arguably didn't have enough stars, true field tilters who could alter the outcome of the most important games.

Parsons changes that upon arrival. Not only does he provide the defense with a game-changing presence, but he also takes the burden off Rashan Gary and the rest of a defensive front that finished 20th in pressure rate in 2024. Parsons should also see plenty of action once he gets up to speed. He has missed just four games in his NFL career and rarely comes off the field, averaging roughly 846 defensive snaps in the regular season.

Evaluating a trade of this magnitude requires considering the viewpoint of the other side. The Cowboys gain a former Pro Bowl defensive tackle to anchor their defensive line as well as two first-rounders to jumpstart their team-building efforts in future years. Dallas also gains roughly $24 million in cap space, either to use in 2025 or to roll over into next season.

However, even a charitable reading of the Cowboys' decisions regarding Parsons paints them as the clear losers in the exchange. While the multiple Day 1 selections sound like a hefty sum on paper, not all first-rounders hold similar value. In this case, the Packers can reasonably expect to qualify for the playoffs and push those picks to the back of the round, and that would significantly diminish the return for Dallas.

That deterioration of pick value will probably surprise most people. If the Packers reach at least the divisional round in each of the next two years -- not a far cry from what they accomplished the past two seasons without Parsons -- the Cowboys would net two draft choices in the mid-20s or worse. Using the Rich Hill value chart and ignoring that NFL teams typically downgrade picks by a round for each additional year they have to wait to use them, the total value of the selections Dallas inherits tops out at roughly the No. 5 overall pick.

Every team in the NFL would trade the No. 5 overall pick and a player like Clark for a 26-year-old, Hall of Fame-trajectory pass rusher like Micah Parsons if they could. That cost doesn't even match what the Seattle Seahawks gave up for Jamal Adams, who yielded two first-rounders (No. 23 overall in 2021 and No. 10 overall in '22) as well as a third-rounder.

The Packers will have to deal with some opportunity costs as a result of adding Parsons. Beyond the prospects they could have selected with those draft picks, the cost of the All-Pro's new extension will make it difficult or impossible to retain Elgton Jenkins, Jayden Reed, Rasheed Walker, and/or Quay Walker beyond their current contracts. Still, the team won't feel those costs this season, and it still has some cap flexibility to maneuver around the big, long-term deals it has on the books.

In the end, the pros mightily outweigh the cons from the Packers' perspective. Before Thursday, they had a genuine shot at winning the Super Bowl this season. Now, with Parsons in the fold, they rank among the literal odds-on favorites to take home the Lombardi Trophy.

This is the type of move Gutekunst has hinted at for years. A week before the 2025 regular season kicks off, he finally made good on that promise.

-- Jason B. Hirschhorn is an award-winning sports journalist and Pro Football Writers of America member. Follow him on social media: @by_JBH on Twitter / @byjbh@bsky.social on Bluesky / @by_jbh on Threads