Source: ohio.com --- Saturday, April 23, 2016
The absence of a high-profile, lighting-rod quarterback like Johnny Manziel or Jameis Winston in this week’s NFL Draft has contributed to Walsh Jesuit High School graduate Connor Cook becoming a poster boy for controversy. Manziel was dissected during the pre-draft process two years ago because of his hard-partying lifestyle. Winston’s character was questioned at every turn last year amid rape allegations. Cook, by all accounts, is a saint compared with them, yet he finds himself under a similar microscope because he was never elected a full-time captain at Michigan State, not even last year as a fifth-year senior. Scouts and media have taken aim at Cook while those who know him have defended him. “He’s taking it in stride,” Michigan State quarterbacks coach Brad Salem said in a recent phone interview. “We talked the other week, and I said, ‘Hey, this is just the beginning of being an NFL quarterback. Wait till you start taking snaps. They’re going to ridicule everything.’” Meanwhile, Cook has attempted to change public perception. He wrote an essay last month for TheMMQB.com in which he explained some coaches at the NFL Scouting Combine immediately asked him about his lack of captaincy. “I understood why they wanted to know,” he wrote. “It is a big deal. I gave them an answer that I feel is truthful: I just didn’t get the votes. Being a captain is a title, but nobody needs a title to lead. Not being a captain never hindered my a ...
from NFL http://ift.tt/1rrRufy
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