The recent Jerry Jones word potato salad regarding his direct negotiations with linebacker Micah Parsons included a gratuitous slap at former Cowboys receiver Dez Bryant and his agent, Jay-Z.
Via Nick Harris of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Jones had this to say about Bryant and Jay-Z: “[W]hen we have a problem with the player, the agent is nowhere to be found. Jay-Z said that Dez would make all meetings. Jay-Z and I negotiated the contract, spent hours. He said, ‘Anybody in my organization is on time.’ He said, ‘My office used to be on the street corner, and I’ve always been early. So, they will be on time.’ And what did I say? I said, ‘I’m going to call you [when I have a problem].’ He quit taking my call.”
Bryant responded on Twitter, with an all-caps warning for Jerry. (We’ve edited it, so that we’re not screaming at your eyeballs.)
“Jerry Jones,” Bryant said, “I don’t think it’s smart to mention my name. I kept quiet about a lot of unfair shit. On some G shit. We can have story time if that’s what we are doing.”
Jay-Z’s sports agency, Roc Nation, issued a separate statement that takes issue with the claim that Jay-Z stopped taking Jerry’s calls. (Again, we’ve edited it from the all-caps tweet.)
“In 2015, at the 21 Club, on a napkin, Jerry Jones, Juan Perez, Shawn ‘Jay-Z’ Carter, and Stephen Jones negotiated a five-year, $70 million deal, which included a $45 million guarantee and a $20 million signing bonus for Dez Bryant. At the time, it was the second-largest contract for a wide receiver in NFL history.
“The claim that Mr. Carter or Roc Nation representatives did not return a call from Jerry Jones is not only a false statement, but it’s also a comical one.”
Setting aside the question of how Jay-Z was directly negotiating NFL contracts without being licensed by the NFLPA to do so, the currently salient point is this. Jerry Jones, in trying to put out the fire arising from Parsons requesting a trade, may have accidentally turned the hose on a couple of hornets’ nests.
We’ll sit back and wait to see if he gets stung.
