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FRISCO, Texas — Across all of professional sports, some athletes are simply officiated differently because their physical gifts are incomparable even amongst their peers.
This contrast is most noticeable in the NBA where a player like Hall of Fame center Shaquille O’Neal back in his Los Angeles Lakers prime had to be officiated another way. O’Neal’s speed and agility down on the low block in tandem with his size and strength made it impossible for opposing big men to contain him while playing normal low post defense. Simple as that, which meant his defenders needed to resort to a style of defense that, by rule, meant they were fouling him pretty much every time he touched the basketball in the paint. O’Neal’s defenders would get into foul trouble, but they wouldn’t all foul out. Otherwise there wouldn’t be a game to be played.
That’s a reality Dallas Cowboys two-time First-Team All-Pro edge rusher Micah Parsons is confronting in his third NFL season. The 24-year-old leads the NFL in quarterback pressures (97), quarterback pressure rate (23%) and pass rush win rate (37.6%).
“Oh man, it’s distinct, unique, whip out your vocabulary,” Dallas Cowboys head coach Mike McCarthy said Wednesday when asked to describe Parsons’ speed and abilities. “The speed and his get-off and his ability to split two, he’s the No. 1 pressure player in the National Football League, and he has a tremendous skill set. He’s definitely unique.
While Parsons is clearly on track to become just the fifth defensive player in NFL history to be a first-team All-Pro player in each of his first three seasons, he feels like his impact could be even larger than it already is for the Cowboys’ fifth-ranked scoring defense (19.1 points per game allowed) and that he is being restricted by the way he is officiated.
“I don’t really say too much, I just keep it rolling bro. It is what it is,” Parsons said Wednesday…
Source link : https://www.cbssports.com/nfl/news/cowboys-micah-parsons-on-how-hes-officiated-refs-dont-understand-the-plays-i-can-make-with-my-speed/
Author : Garrett Podell
Publish date : 2023-12-29 13:23:05
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