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Green Bay Packers star Micah Parsons spent time on Friday remembering his former teammate, Marshawn Kneeland, who tragically died from an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound this week.
Officials confirmed the 24-year-old died from a self-inflicted gunshot after a police chase in Texas. Parsons talked about the respect he has for Kneeland.
“Marshawn’s a guy who loved his anime, loved his video games like anybody else,” Parsons said, according to ESPN. “To me, he always showed me nothing but respect from the moment he came into the locker room. He respected me as a player; he respected me as a person. So, I have nothing but high respect for him. If there’s anything his family needs, I’ll be the first person to help or offer anything I can do to offer a person. I just hope that he finds his peace and his family peace in the situation.”
Parsons also spoke about the pressures that athletes face and mental health as it relates to athletes.
“We’d be fools to act like what we do isn’t enough pressure as it is,” Parsons said. “We live in a pressure job where you’re expected to deliver and you’re expected to play a certain way, and when you don’t, it’s easy to say, ‘Oh, man, it’s so sad,’ but a lot of people are hard on people. ‘You suck. You stink. We hope you die.’ There’s a lot of harsh words and harsh things that get said about people.”
COWBOYS’ DAK PRESCOTT SHARES EMOTIONAL MESSAGE AFTER LOSING TEAMMATE MARSHAWN KNEELAND
“As athletes, most of us see it — some of us don’t — but we choose to wait until somebody passes to realize what we say and what we do, how it can affect people. We don’t all understand what happened to ‘9–4’ in (this) instance, but mental health is important about being there for each other, whether we’re going through hard times or whatever it may be. It’s tough. It’s a hard job. But it’s hard to be a person sometimes. I think sometimes people evade that you are human. They try to go away from that. Sometimes you wish things was different because … obviously, it was Marshawn the person that we wish we could’ve been there for him, not Marshawn the uniform. So, I’m just trying to be there for people more the person side than the football side.”
The star defender said that some of his former Dallas Cowboys teammates couldn’t comprehend the loss of Kneeland.
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“I’ve got former teammates that are devastated,” Parsons said. “They can’t comprehend it. Losing a teammate is like a brother. This is someone — people don’t realize how much we’re actually together, like time spent. That’s the challenge. Like regardless, the NFL is like a brotherhood. It doesn’t matter who it is. If you’re breaking sweat, breaking blood with someone, whether it’s opposite team or same team, it’s a brotherhood.”
Kneeland was in his second season with the Cowboys after being selected 56th overall in the 2024 NFL Draft. He died just days after he recorded his first NFL touchdown in a game against the Arizona Cardinals on Monday night.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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