Mike Tanier's take:
Micah Parsons, LB, Penn State
Mike McCarthy
said recently that the Cowboys need more "speed and energy," per Jon Machota of The Athletic. Plum tuckered out by the utterance, McCarthy then scheduled appointments at his favorite mid-practice day spa, then took to bed with the vapors.
When someone said the Cowboys needed more speed in the early 1990s, three VTOL helicopters immediately took off for Columbia.
(I'd like to thank McCarthy for the soundbite. I didn't have any really good Cowboys gags entering Thursday, because they have been acting rather normal lately).
Parsons reminds me of Bobby Wagner. He has almost telepathic recognition and reaction skills. He sometimes shoots interior gaps and brings down ball-carriers so quickly that I have a hard time processing what happened when watching film. (
"OK, I found Parsons on the screen, it's first-and-10, the offense is in the Pist—oh snap, the play is over.")
Parsons is also a high-impact blitzer with a spin move and the agility to beat offensive tackles around the corner. He should adjust quickly to NFL coverage responsibilities.
Parsons was allegedly involved in a 2018 hazing incident which bears mentioning. You can read about it
here. Penn State coach James Franklin comes off far worse than anyone, frankly, which is par for the course for college football. The incident sounds just a little too wild to be brushed off as "boys being boys" but not wild enough to make me fear I will be forced to someday write one of *those* thinkpieces about Parsons.
The Cowboys astutely slid down when the top cornerbacks were off the board and got the sort of player Jerry Jones loves. This is a very "Cowboys" pick. It's also a solid pick.
Grade: B+