From a quality Day 2 option, to a trendy top-20 pick: Indiana WR Omar Cooper has spent the last few months rocketing up big boards and suddenly finds himself as most people's idea of a top-5 wide receiver prospect ahead of the 2026 NFL Draft.

Today, we'll get to know Cooper a bit better by breaking down four cool things about the 22-year-old talent, including:

• How we got here: Hometown hero
• Biggest strengths: Why be a king, when you can be a (YAC) God
• 3 cool stats: No block, no rock
• Causes for concern: That's a lot of screens and RPOs

And of course, we'll finish things off with several provocative comps that will hopefully get the people going.

As always: It's a great day to be great.

NFL Draft Scouting Report For WR

How Omar Cooper Got Here: Hometown Hero

Cooper spent his high school career excelling at football, basketball and the long jump at Lawrence North in Indianapolis. We aren't talking about the most coveted recruit in the world here—247 rated Cooper as a 3-star and the 43rd-ranked WR in the 2022 class—but that was still enough to earn scholarship offers from the likes of West Virginia, Arkansas and Cincinnati, among others.

Ultimately, Cooper decided to stay local and enroll with the Hoosiers. He began his career in Bloomington with a redshirt season and then proceeded to catch just 18 passes in 2023 … and then Mr. Curt Cignetti came to town.

Suddenly, everything changed. 2024 featured Cooper serving as the de facto deep threat for Kurtis Rourke, while 2025 saw the speedy YAC-ster spend more of his time in the slot catching screens and quick-hitting RPOs from Fernando Mendoza.

Whatever the role: Cooper put up some big-time numbers during his final two years in college.

• 6-0, 199 pounds. 4.42-second 40-yard dash, 37-inch vertical jump
• 2025: 69 receptions-937 yards-13 TD. Second-team All-Big Ten WR.
• 2024: 28-594-7 (21.2 yards per catch)
• Career rushing: 5 carries, 97 yards, 2 TD
• Mock draft projection: No. 16 to the Jets

Even more impressive was the manner in which Cooper went about handling his business–and that now has him looking a LOT like someone who will be taken sooner rather than later in the first round of the 2026 NFL Draft.

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Biggest Strengths: Why be a king, when you can be a (YAC) God

Three strengths that help sum up Cooper's best traits as a football player include:

The man is lethal after the catch: Cooper posted an ELITE missed tackles per reception mark of 0.39 in 2025—that's good for the seventh-best mark among 309 Power Four WRs with at least 50 catches in a season since 2021! His ability to transition to a runner after catching the football is a major strength, as is his Gumby-esque contact balance while fending off would-be tacklers. If you wanted to point to Cooper's “superpower,” this is it.

Checks the size-and-speed boxes: The man is 6-0, weighs 199 pounds, and ran a verified 4.42-second 40-yard dash at the NFL Scouting Combine. That's a pretty damn great combo! Sure, there's more to excelling at the professional level than being big and fast … but hey, it helps! Cooper has the requisite tool set to function either inside or outside for any NFL offense, which is a heck of a lot more than most 22-year-olds can say.

The body control is pretty damn great: You've probably already seen Cooper's ridiculous game-winning touchdown vs. Penn State, but if not, enjoy. We also see this trait pop up plenty during his always-fun YAC adventures. Still, my personal favorite example of this is a callback to Cooper's redshirt freshman season when he managed to get his head … and feet … down inbounds on the sideline. Whatever example you want to use: This is a cerebral athlete with the sort of flexibility and body control to make some truly ridiculous plays.

Three Cool Omar Cooper Stats: No block, no rock

Three more cool stats and facts about Cooper that line up with what you'll see from watching him play:

• No block, no rock: Cooper graded out as PFF's 31st-ranked run-blocker among 276 qualified Power Four wide receivers. That's good for the third-best mark among most of the top draft-eligible prospects in this class.
• RPO city: Run-pass-options are more frequent in college football than the NFL due to the difference in how much further college linemen can block downfield (3 yards vs. 1). No Power 4 QB had more RPO dropbacks than Mendoza (104) in 2025, and no pass catcher had more RPO targets (40) than Cooper.
• Screens? In this economy?: PFF data indicates Cooper didn't receive a single screen target during the 2023 and 2024 seasons … and then he suddenly racked up 26 in 2025. The increase is undoubtedly in large part due to Cooper working more out of the slot: He spent just 8.5% of his snaps in the slot in 2024 before ballooning up to 77.3% in 2025.

Causes For Concern With Omar Cooper: That's a lot of screens and RPOs

Of course, as is the case with any prospect, there are some potential red-ish flags to concern yourself with here.

Relatively later breakout: Cooper didn't have too much going on until his final year at Indiana. In fact, the fine folks at Player Profiler determined that his 21.7 breakout age is just in the 22nd percentile at the position. Better late than never, of course, but it would've been a bit cooler if we saw Cooper put his best foot forward earlier in his college career.

Didn't exactly dominate against the best competition: Many will quickly ridicule this idea and dismiss it with a quick five-second clip of Cooper's aforementioned incredible game-winning touchdown against Penn State. And hey, maybe those people will be right! Still, I can't help but have at least some concern about Cooper's lack of numbers against the toughest teams he faced. Consider: Cooper gained 80-plus yards in only six of his 42 career games … and they were against Indiana State (x2), Maryland (x2), Michigan State and Western Illinois. More concerning is the fact that his YAC superpower simply wasn't the same in big-time matchups (Ohio State, Penn State, Iowa, Notre Dame, Oregon, Alabama, Miami, Michigan):

• Cooper in big-time matchups: 0.25 missed tackles forced per reception, 5.2 yards after the catch per reception
• Cooper vs. everyone else: 0.34 missed tackles forced per reception, 7.2 yards after the catch per reception

Ran a LOT of screens and RPOs at Indiana: We mentioned Cooper's shift in role from 2024 to 2025, but man: It really is alarming just how infrequently he was asked to run routes with a normal dropback last season. This isn't to suggest Cooper is incapable of doing so; just realize his percentage of targets to be screens or RPOs REALLY stands out among the other top draft-eligible receivers in this class.

And now for the moment you've all been waiting for: My favorite comps for Cooper:

• Deebo Samuel on a diet
• Rashee Rice with a clean record
• Middle-class-man's CeeDee Lamb
• Cal Naughton Jr.

Best of luck to Cooper on his NFL journey and thank you all for reading!

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