Name: Edgerrin Cooper 

School: Texas A&M

Year: Junior

Position: Linebacker

Measurables: 6’2”, 230 lb

Combine: ARM: 34”. HAND: 9 ¾’. VERTICAL: 34.5” BROAD: 9’10” 40-YD DASH: 4.51. 10-YD SPLIT: 1.54. 

Stats:

Courtesy of sports-reference.com

General Info

Edgerrin Cooper had 26 Division I offers coming out of high school in 2020. Rated a four-star prospect by 247 Sports, Cooper chose Texas A&M over many football powerhouses, including Oklahoma, LSU, and Florida State. 

Cooper appeared in 10 games as a freshman in 2020 and ended up redshirting. As a redshirt freshman in 2021, he appeared in all 12 games with one start and was fourth on the team with 58 tackles. Cooper appeared in 11 games with eight starts as a RS sophomore in 2022, again finishing fourth on the team in tackles with 61. 

Cooper broke out his RS junior season in 2023, finishing with a team-leading 84 tackles–including 17 for loss–to go along with eight sacks, two forced fumbles, and a fumble recovery scoop-up that he ran back for a touchdown. He was the defensive MVP for the Aggies and ended up on multiple All-American teams, including being named a first-team AP all-American.

Cooper tested extremely well at the scouting Combine, finishing with the fifth-best RAS of any linebacker at the Combine. He timed the third-fastest 40-yard dash at the Combine, clocking in at 4.51. 

Positional Skills:

Strengths

Cooper has a chance to be the first off-ball linebacker taken in this year’s draft due to his college production, size, and athleticism. Do you want a guy that plays with an edge and is unafraid on the field? If you answered yes, Cooper may be your guy.  

One aspect of Cooper’s game that jumps off the screen is his speed. He clocked a 4.51 forty at the Combine, and his game tape matches that straight-line speed. He regularly attacks the ball carrier and is unafraid to go head-on with offensive players. The NFL has evolved into a league that features quarterbacks that aren’t necessarily always run-first, but are very athletic outside the pocket and are dangerous with their legs. Cooper was an effective blitzer and spy while facing more athletic quarterbacks, using his speed and vision to mirror speedy quarterbacks. He has phenomenal closing speed and burst on blitzes and when chasing ball carriers. 

Cooper plays with a high football IQ. He seems to diagnose screen plays quickly; he could be better in diagnosing run plays. He looks fluid dropping back into coverage and recognizes where he should be in zone reads. He was the eight-best rated draft-eligible coverage linebacker in 2023 with a PFF grade of 85.5. He also has 34 inch arms that come in handy on blitzes or over the middle to disrupt passing lanes, and for wrapping up ball carriers.

Cooper went from ½ a sack over his first three seasons at A&M to eight in his final year and 17 tackles for loss. He registered 56 “stops” (tackles that constitute a failure for the offense) defensively, good for 10th-best among draft-eligible linebackers. The Aggies let Cooper use his athleticism to be a playmaker on the defense and often let him roam free, almost “position-less” at times. Sure, he’s labeled an off-ball linebacker, but Cooper works most effectively when he’s allowed to just go out on the field and use his athleticism to make plays. A creative defensive coordinator will have fun with a player as athletic as Cooper.   

Weaknesses

For as fast and athletic as Cooper may be, sometimes it’s his speed that actually hurts him on the field. Cooper is as downhill as they come, but oftentimes will over-pursue ball carriers and blow by them with said speed. He only registered 11 missed tackles in 2023, but he whiffed on seemingly far more than that. Unfortunately, “whiffs” aren’t a registered stat. He makes some nice open-field tackles at times, but when he whiffs, he whiffs hard. Cooper does well diagnosing plays, but sometimes is just TOO hyped-up on the field. He oftentimes was able to recover and make a tackle because of his speed, but in the NFL, everybody is fast; recovery might not always be an option. 

As highly rated as his PFF coverage grade was, he still allowed 14 catches on 16 targets, albeit for only 132 yards. He did drop back into zone well and knew where he should be, but a lot of times was so focused on the quarterback and QB’s eyes, he lost track of receivers in his zone, especially if it was a tight end. Finding that happy medium where he tracks his guy and keeps his eyes on the quarterback will need to be a big improvement for Cooper. 

Cooper didn’t test in the three-cone or shuttle drills at the Combine, so scouts weren’t able to gauge his agility numbers. For as good as his footwork is straight-line and backpedaling, he often looks clunky laterally. His lateral footwork looked decent in positional drills at the Combine, but it’s not as fluid as his forward/backward. 

Fit with the Packers:

Cooper is similar in athleticism to another current Packer: Quay Walker. Quay had a slight edge in RAS, but Cooper doesn’t have numbers for two of the drills (three-cone, shuttle), so there is something to be desired there. You might be asking yourself: why would we want two “Quays” on the field at the same time? Let me explain. 

Cooper and Quay are playmakers. And the Green Bay Packers need playmakers. Yes, they are both labeled off-ball linebackers and are similar in position, but this isn’t the NFL of 20 years ago. Heck, this isn’t even the NFL of 10 years ago. 

Quay and Cooper are what I like to call the “modern-day linebacker.” The modern-day linebacker is smaller than the heavy “thumpers” that used to roam the middle of the field. (Think Brian Urlacher.) These new-age linebackers may line up in the box, but they have the athleticism to move around the defense like a chess piece: as a blitzer, a spy, an enforcer in the run-game. You could call them position-less if you like. Now imagine having two of those guys lurking on the field at the same time. Seems like a tasty thought to me. I’m sure new defensive coordinator Jeff Hafley would love to have two “dawgs” at his disposal. 

Would we still need a true middle linebacker, someone to be the caller of plays, our “QB” on that side of the ball? Absolutely. Maybe that’s Isaiah McDuffie, maybe it’s a free agent down the road, maybe it’s a fellow draft pick. Who knows? (Gutey probably knows).  

Look at the 49ers. What do they do so well on defense? They take away the middle of the field. And how do they do that? With two highly skilled, highly athletic linebackers allowed to be playmakers. The 49ers are very effective at shutting down the middle of the field. Green Bay had a taste of that with De’Vondre Campbell and Quay, but both guys seemed to battle injuries and didn’t stay on the field together as often as the Packers would have liked. They need to have that. 

Fred Warner is a three-time, first-team all-pro at linebacker for the 49ers. He didn’t do that by only racking up a bunch of tackles as a boring, non-playmaking linebacker in the middle of the field. He’s a playmaker. And it just-so-happens that Edgerrrin Cooper models his game after Warner. Now, that doesn’t guarantee he’s going to BE Fred Warner, but studying how one of the current greats at linebacker plays his position is a good start. 

Cooper fits as a late-first, early-second round pick. Green Bay has reportedly visited with Cooper three times so far during the pre-draft process, meeting with him at the Shrine Bowl, the Combine, and scheduling a top-30 visit with him–there is clearly interest, or they're just blowing a lot of smoke. There is a possibility Green Bay would have to spend a first-round pick on him with no guarantee he would fall to them at 41– I'm not sure Gutey would be willing to pick him at 25, though. A trade-up into the top of the second round is also a possibility. 

Campbell is gone after three seasons in Green Bay. Outside of Quay, McDuffie, Eric Wilson, and special-teamer Kristian Welch, there is a need for more bodies at linebacker. Maybe Cooper is the answer. 

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