Psychoanalyzing Jerry Jones is the safest and cheapest dollar there is to be made in all of sports punditry. The template is already there, and everyone uses it. He's old. He's powerful. He's competitive. He's spiteful. He's a megalomaniac with the tongue of an auctioneer. Check, check, check, check, and double check.
Thus, his decision to trade rather than sign edge rusher Micah Parsons is being painted as a radical departure in his business-doing mode because rather than give in and sign him himself at the player's preferred rate of compensation, he hate-traded him to Green Bay for useful but hardly Parsonsesque defensive tackle Kenny Clark and two first-round draft choices.
Fear not, though, Jerry Whisperers. This is not New Vengeful Jerry—it's just him doubling down on Items 1, 2, and 4. He saw how he was being portrayed, as the vibranium-larynxed soft touch making the same mistake he always makes, and decided as many old folks do to show everyone what's what and who's who. Oh, it's still a mistake, born of his well-catalogued list of character flaws, but it's a different one. It's no longer "I want another Super Bowl before I die and will do anything to get it," but "He's not getting over on me, no matter what."
It's also that dangerous moment in a sports owner's life when he finally behaves as the product rather than the producer. Jones has always fancied himself as an Al Davis protege, the football man with money, only he's never really been the football man. He's just played at being one, with the result being two Super Bowl wins by bête noire Jimmy Johnson and a third still credited to Johnson even though he'd been spite-fired by Jones the year before. He wanted one for himself, and presumably still wants one, just not at the cost of looking like an all-day sucker.
It's a different coda than the Netflix hagiography of him, to be sure, but he has reached that time of life where the story is no longer the song but the singer. He knew people were laughing at him for bollixing up the Parsons deal by trying to be too clever by half, end-running Parsons's agent, so he decided to teach the audience a lesson.
Guess what. They're still laughing.
The football is easy to figure out. Dallas traded an elite player for three players of almost certainly lesser value. Jones of course said the trade makes the Cowboys better, but nobody's listening to that any more. Jerry has recast himself as the crank in the castle, and that's what he shall be until he chooses to re-reinvent himself. Put it this way: He is doing a reverse Leslie Nielsen, the serious actor turned hilarious. And somehow, he will either pull it off to the detriment of the football division, or fail to the detriment of the business division.
The Cowboys are not impervious to downturns in fashion, any more than Manchester United, currently being savaged globally as a pathetic relic of days long gone by after losing to League Two straggler Grimsby Town. They have become so wedded to our view of Jerry, though, that the new version he presents us is not likely to play nearly so well. This is Cincinnati Bengals owner Mike Brown territory, where the money matters and the principle of not paying the money matters more—and even Brown caved on Trey Hendrickson, so there's clearly a limit on even the most sacrosanct corners of principle.
So yes, Jerry said no, deciding to no longer be the crusty but doting parent in player relationships, but that’s not a new Jerry. It's the old Jerry, only quintupling down on the part where it's all about Jerry, first, last, and always. It’s not a Jerry you'd like to invite to Christmas dinner, but it's still Jerry. More Jerry than ever.
