Micah Parsons says the lion is always hungry, and he's proving it time and again. Having now appeared in his first NFL Pro Bowl following a historic rookie debut for the Dallas Cowboys, the 2021 Butkus Award winner as the league's top linebacker warned ahead of the event in Las Vegas that he was "going to go hard" and play "like Sean Taylor" on Sunday. Visibly frustrated by the lack of effort in the NFC's 41-35 loss Sunday, Parsons is thankful for the honor to have been named to the 2022 Pro Bowl but is back to champing at the bit to get his hands on opposition in September.
And when asked what he's looking to improve upon for Year 2, the first-team All-Pro linebacker was unequivocal.
"Bro, I can get better everywhere," Parsons said, via ESPN. "I can become a better pass rusher. I can become a better LB. Like, anything. I just feel like I'm just out there raw and I was just learning and I grew and I kept getting better and better throughout the year.
"No one's ever perfect. There's always room to grow in many ways to get better."
That's music to the Cowboys' ears, and especially defensive coordinator Dan Quinn, who made the decision to stay put in Dallas for the coming season -- something Parsons pleaded publicly with him to consider doing. The two have developed a powerful relationship that helped lead Parsons to a team-high 13 sacks, 84 combined tackles (second most) with 64 of them being solo, 20 tackles for loss (first), three forced fumbles (t-1st) and three pass deflections en route to helping lead an oft-injured Cowboys defense from worst to first in the span of only one season.
Somebody needs to report Micah Parsons for assault after this #DallasCowboys #NFL #ProBowl pic.twitter.com/KwycT6vwWN
— BetterThanVegas (@btvbets) February 6, 2022
His phenomenal season didn't have a storybook ending, however, with the former 12th overall pick seeing his Cowboys dismissed from the playoffs in the first round at the hands of the San Francisco 49ers -- the singular thing he says he remembers most about Year 1. As the organization begins sifting through what to do in free agency and the 2022 NFL Draft, Parsons is confident the wildly-improved defense in Dallas will only get better.
"The more we get this going, the more we get guys to buy into what Q's trying to build in Dallas, the better we're going to get," he said. "I think we have one of the better defenses in the league this year and we're only going to get better with the more experience."
Working in tandem with fellow first-time Pro Bowler Trevon Diggs, who matched the team's single-season interception tally long held by legendary former defensive back Everson Walls, Parsons helps establish a potent one-two defensive punch that Quinn aims to again weaponize against offenses in 2022.
And if an always-famished Parsons can actually figure out how to level up on an eye-popping 2021 season, he'll find himself named to a second consecutive Pro Bowl, only he'll hope to be unavailable due to preparation for the Super Bowl. Because while eating gazelles and impala on a weekly basis are satisfying, he's actually stalking the elephant in the room: a Lombardi trophy.
