Sierra grad Cooks still battling for a starting LB spot

Anyone who watched last season’s Navy-Air Force game noticed outside linebacker Jamil Cooks.

Here’s a quick refresher: Cooks was the Air Force freshman who leaped over the Navy offensive line to block a field goal, and the one who startlingly vaulted over a 6-foot-5 blocker in front of the Midshipmen punter to knock down a fourth-quarter punt.

Cooks was an unknown freshman before that game and an exciting and popular young prospect after it. Raw athleticism like Cooks showed against Navy isn’t usually seen in service academy games. And, he was just a freshman.

When Andre Morris graduated, it was easy to make the connection between Cooks, a Sierra High graduate, and the vacant starting outside linebacker job, but his ascent up the depth chart hasn’t happened so fast. Junior Alex Means had more experience in the defense and held the starting job for most of the first few weeks of camp. Even Stephan Atrice, who returned from a two-year religious mission this past winter, spent more time with the first-team defense early in camp than Cooks, who after all, was still just a sophomore.

“He still has a ways to go, like a lot of them, but he’s doing good things,” defensive coordinator Matt Wallerstedt said.

“His consistency has improved, but it has to continue to grow and go to another level,” Air Force coach Troy Calhoun said.

Cooks has come on as camp has progressed. He has been with the first-team defense in its base package for most of the past week. That bodes well for his chances of being a starter for the season opener Sept. 3 against South Dakota.  

A slight position change helped. Air Force uses its outside linebackers in “boundary” and “field” positions. When the ball is marked on the hash mark, the “boundary” linebacker lines up on the short side of the field nearest to the sideline, the “field” linebacker will take the wide side of the field. Cooks was used to “field” linebacker, but Air Force wants its players to be versatile, so he was learning “boundary” early in camp.

When Cooks went back to working more at “field” linebacker in camp, he started playing better.  

“Even though I need to know both and I have to know both, I feel very comfortable on that side of the field with a year under my belt,” Cooks said. When I came back to play it, it was like ‘I remember this.’ It was clicking for me.”

Cooks still is a young player on a veteran team, so he’ll probably split time whether he starts or comes off the bench. As far as his chances of starting, he isn’t going to become distracted by it.

“You wonder, but you have to control the things you can control,” Cooks said. “I’m going to be assignment sound and do the things coaches ask.”