Stop comparing people to Reggie White

I don’t know if the Packers will land Micah Parsons in a trade, but what I do know is this: if Parsons comes to Green Bay, it’s not even remotely comparable to Reggie White’s arrival in 1993.

Parsons is undeniably great. He’s had double-digit sacks every year he’s been in the league, and deserves every penny of what he’s going to get by whoever decides to pay him. He’s a certified game wrecker.

He’s not Reggie White.

When White arrived in Green Bay, he wasn’t just a great player — he was already a Hall of Famer. Generally speaking, breaking the 100-sack threshold all but guarantees you a spot in Canton, and through his first eight seasons in the NFL, White already had 124 to his name. He led the league in sacks twice, taking the quarterback down a combined 39 times across the 1988-89 seasons.

And he’d actually gotten a bit of a late start. He spent his first two seasons after departing the University of Tennessee in the USFL, chasing quarterbacks on behalf of the Memphis Showboats. Bruce Smith may be the NFL’s all-time sack leader, but he only rules that particular statistical kingdom at the pleasure of Reggie White.

That White would bestow his greatness on Green Bay, a moribund franchise that had won double-digit games just once in the time White had been a professional football player, was a staggering decision. Yes, there were financial incentives at play, but you can make a case that White didn’t accept the most lucrative terms. He signed with the Packers because it was where he wanted to be, and precious few football players could have been described that way since the Lombardi era.

What’s more, White was actually a great player for the Packers. He recorded 68.5 sacks over his six seasons with the team, winning the league’s Defensive Player of the Year award in 1998. His sack total still ranks third in team history among players for whom we have official stats, and he did it all in six seasons on the wrong side of 30.

And, of course, he was a crucial part of the Packers’ Super Bowl XXXI win, taking down Drew Bledsoe three times to beat the Patriots. He’s one of just two players in Packers history to do that in a Super Bowl, and Willie Davis did it in an era where sacks weren’t yet an official stat.

This post really isn’t about Parsons. Landing him would change the Packers in a meaningful way. The point is, nobody can match what White brought to the Packers. We’d be silly to even make the comparison in the first place.