Amari Cooper landed in a perfect situation last week when he signed with the Raiders.
With two of the five wide receivers on the Raiders’ 53-man roster entering their first NFL season, Cooper had a clear path to playing time in Las Vegas, but according to The Athletic’s Tashan Reed, Cooper didn’t impress in his week of practice with the team.
“In theory, Cooper would’ve provided some veteran insurance to the room. According to a team sources, however, Cooper was unimpressive in practice and didn’t have the look of a difference maker,” Reed reported on Thursday.
This week, a video made its way around the internet showing Cooper running drills at practice and the 31-year-old didn’t appear to be in good shape. He looked slow and held back by a little extra in the belly.
Without warning, Cooper left the team on Thursday and is reportedly retiring from the NFL.
Cooper leaves a hole at wide receiver in Las Vegas, but one popular personality in the organization that isn’t going to miss Cooper is former color commentator Lincoln Kennedy.
Kennedy didn’t want his former team to sign Cooper in the first place.
“I remember when Amari was drafted, I was one of the first guys in the Raiders interview. I looked in his eyes and realized he didn’t want to be a Raider,” Kennedy said in July.
“I’m not saying that it’s slight in him. You don’t have any choice, a lot of times, where you’re going to be drafted. He didn’t enjoy his time in Oakland. That’s why he couldn’t wait to get out of there,” Kennedy continued. “He thought he found success in Dallas. My point for Amari is, he never took the next step to develop his route running skills. He is not a good route running receiver.”
“[He’s a] solid receiver when you get him in open space, but not a good route running receiver for what I think the Raiders need. I think they have something like that already on their roster. It doesn’t make sense for me to… go out and spend money over a name. That’s all it is right now. That’s all Amari Cooper is, is a name. And I don’t think they should do it.”
x: @raidersbeat
Chip Kelly blowing smoke up everybody’s ***. It was a stupid signing to begin with.
The team did themselves a favor letting him go. Need new not old players!! They will still wish a million times that they should have gotten Jim Harbaugh as head coach when they had the chance!! I believe we may be headed in the right direction but only time will tell. We have to keep stocking young talent in the draft. Need a bunch of defensive help in the secondary. We still need a franchise QB and so many things to complete in our division alone!!