{"id":169912,"date":"2026-04-19T04:39:35","date_gmt":"2026-04-19T04:39:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/169912\/"},"modified":"2026-04-19T04:39:35","modified_gmt":"2026-04-19T04:39:35","slug":"two-reasons-why-omar-cooper-jr-could-become-pittsburghs-first-round-exception","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/169912\/","title":{"rendered":"Two Reasons Why Omar Cooper Jr. Could Become Pittsburgh’s First-Round Exception"},"content":{"rendered":"

Just earlier today, we noted the history<\/a> of the Pittsburgh Steelers first-round picks. Every selection since at least 2010 has either come in for a pre-draft visit or had a decision-maker, general manager or head coach attend their Pro Day. History that is tangible, strong, and logical. It seems unbreakable. Why would a team use its first-round pick on a player they barely interacted with? Making exceptions seems silly and has been proven wrong before. If anyone is going to do it, though, it could be Indiana WR Omar Cooper Jr.<\/p>\n

For two reasons that fall into the same camp. Pittsburgh has the resources to find out everything they need to know.<\/p>\n

Thank two men for that. Wide receivers coach Adam Henry and senior offensive assistant Frank Cignetti Jr.<\/p>\n

We\u2019ve documented Henry\u2019s ties to Cooper before. In 2022, Henry served as Indiana\u2019s wide receivers coach<\/a>, where he worked alongside a then-freshman Cooper. Cooper hardly saw the field, but those were formative years that paid off after Henry left. Former Steelers wide receiver Demarcus Ayers was also on the Indiana staff at the time, and in our February interview,<\/a> he offered insight into that dynamic.<\/p>\n

\u201cAdam doesn\u2019t get a lot of credit for the development of Omar because he hasn\u2019t coached in the past few years. But a lot of things that Omar\u2019s doing now were the things that we were instilling in him as a true freshman.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cOmar really trusted Adam. I think Omar gained a lot of confidence early on by just seeing how Adam worked and how intentional he was with the guys. And then me being a young coach, just sticking by his side, basically reemphasizing what Adam was saying every single day in his ear to give him that confidence.\u201d<\/p>\n

Henry offers insight that even teams that brought Cooper in for visits couldn\u2019t glean. How coachable is he? What\u2019s his work ethic like? How does he respond to adversity?\u00a0All the important questions Henry has first-hand knowledge of. Sure, Pittsburgh, or any team, could call up Indiana\u2019s coaching staff and ask similar, but the current group is more inclined to tout Cooper positively. And they weren\u2019t there for Cooper\u2019s early years on campus. Henry will offer a fair and candid evaluation to give Pittsburgh the best information possible.<\/p>\n

Frank Cignetti Jr. is another lifeline. Brother of current Indiana head coach Curt Cignetti, it\u2019s easy to think those two can \u2013 and have \u2013 talked about Indiana\u2019s deep pool of draft prospects. Curt doesn\u2019t seem like the coach who sugarcoats to anyone, but he can be more honest and true to Frank than some outside coach he doesn\u2019t know.<\/p>\n

Even before considering the connections, Cooper is a clean prospect. Productive. Plus character. Well-known and tested. There isn\u2019t much a team needs to dig into. Factor in Pittsburgh\u2019s two unique connections, Cooper\u2019s former coach and the brother of the team\u2019s head coach, and the Steelers may have decided there was no need to bring Cooper in. Why have him sit in a room with Henry, a man he already knows, for the two to have conversations they had years ago?<\/p>\n

Still, Cooper becoming the pick is a stretch. It breaks history, and on paper, there\u2019s less evidence that the team will take him than there is for those hosted visits. Making the case for Cooper means squinting and spinning in a way we haven\u2019t before. If Cooper breaks the mold and is the selection, it\u2019ll be easy to explain why he\u2019s the exception.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Just earlier today, we noted the history of the Pittsburgh Steelers first-round picks. Every selection since at least…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":169913,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[76431,76432,20878,73,75,74,1833],"class_list":["post-169912","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-pittsburgh","tag-adam-henry","tag-frank-cignetti-jr","tag-omar-cooper-jr","tag-pittsburgh","tag-pittsburgh-headlines","tag-pittsburgh-news","tag-pittsburgh-steelers"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/169912","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=169912"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/169912\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/169913"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=169912"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=169912"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=169912"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}