GREEN BAY – Whatever emotions Micah Parsons may have when he returns to Dallas to face his old team Sunday night, he's trying not to get caught up in them.
The All-Pro addition to the Packers' defense, acquired in a late August trade when the Cowboys didn't meet his contract demands, said Wednesday "it's just going to be another game for me," and that he's fueled by "trying to be the best player" rather than anything external.
So whether or not he feels anything extra for this one may not really be known until the action gets going. Either way, he believes whatever is thought or said ahead of time won't matter when the ball is kicked off.
"Once the game starts, who's going to be worried about any trade?" Parsons said. "It's just me against them five in front of me, and then we've got one common goal, and that's to win the football game. How we win the football game is winning the line of scrimmage and affecting Dak (Prescott) and how good he's been playing this year."
Indeed, Parsons' former QB has thrown for 800 yards and completed 71% of his passes through three games this season, with the Cowboys off to a 1-2 start.
Parsons said he's still in touch with several former Dallas teammates, and he appreciates the relationships he built, including with a number of young offensive linemen he tutored to an extent as a practice opponent. Now he'll be trying to beat them in a game with an AT&T Stadium suite full of fans looking on.
He still has his suite, unable to get a refund on it after being traded to the Packers right before the start of the regular season. He even checked with former Packer Kenny Clark, who was traded to Dallas in the deal, if he wanted to swap stadium suites, to no avail.
As for the Dallas fans, Parsons is expecting a warm welcome back, saying there's "no hard feelings" from his side. He's also not concerned about Cowboys owner Jerry Jones saying there won't be any tribute video on the massive stadium scoreboards upon Parsons' return.
"There's a lot of things I can consider disrespectful about this process, but I wouldn't say the tribute is one of them," he said. "I guess I can (receive) my tribute in a win, I hope."
A win would help the Packers further move past a frustrating game they couldn't close out in Cleveland. Parsons called losing that 10-point fourth-quarter lead "painful," and it sapped much of the momentum generated by Green Bay's strong 2-0 start.
Getting back on the winning track is first and foremost on his mind as the Packers approach their early bye week. In that context, the difference between 3-1 and 2-2 feels enormous.
"At the end of the day, it's about resetting, rebuilding," said Parsons, who has 1½ sacks so far with the Packers. "We've got a good chance to go into a bye with a win and it's the utmost importance that we come in dialed in, focused, doing all the little things to make sure we don't give away another game.
"What we've got to do is relock in and win this one."
That's how his new teammates feel, too. While the Packers are happy they aren't going against Parsons in Dallas, there isn't a "win one for Micah" sentiment in the locker room.
They want to appreciate any emotions he might be dealing with, but anything beyond that wouldn't be productive.
"I don't know what that feeling is like, going back to obviously the organization you played for, the team that drafted you, but I'm sure it's probably a weird feeling for him," QB Jordan Love said. "But for the rest of us, just focus on another week for going 1-0."
