Cooper Kupp

Early years

Kupp was born in Yakima, Washington. Kupp attended and graduated from Davis High School in Yakima, Washington in 2012 where he was a two-sport athlete in football and basketball for the Pirates. A two-way All-State selection, he earned first team 4A All-State honors as a defensive back and honorable mention accolades as a wide receiver from the Associated Press, as selected by sportswriters and broadcasters. Kupp was also named by the Seattle Times as a “White Chip” selection, as one of the top 100 prospects in the state of Washington.

Kupp was a unanimous first team All-Columbia Basin Big Nine League wide receiver and defensive back at Davis. He finished his senior season with 60 receptions for 1,059 yards (17.7 per catch) and 18 touchdowns, and scored 22 total touchdowns to set a school record. He also had 11 rushes for 122 yards and two touchdowns as he helped Davis come one game away from a berth in the Washington State 4A Playoffs.

Kupp finished his prep career with 110 catches for 2,100 yards. He was also a three-year letter winner in basketball. Davis finished 23–2 and won the State 4A Tournament championship during his senior year for the Pirates.

2012 season

Kupp attended Eastern Washington University, where he signed to play for coach Beau Baldwin's Eastern Washington Eagles football team in 2012 and redshirted that year. Kupp would eventually be named Eastern's Offensive Scout Team Player of the Year.

2013 season

In 2013, Kupp entered his redshirt freshman year as a starter at wide receiver. Kupp finished the season having set numerous single-season school and national receiving records at the Football Championship Subdivision Level. Kupp has set national freshman records for receiving yards (1,691), total touchdown catches (21), consecutive games with a touchdown catch (14), and receptions (93).

On November 26, 2013, Kupp was named to the All-Big Sky Conference First Team as a unanimous selection and was also the recipient of the conference's first-ever Freshman of the Year Award.

On December 16, 2013, Kupp was named the recipient of the 2013 Jerry Rice Award, given to the top freshman player in the FCS. Kupp is the first Eastern Washington player and first player from the Big Sky Conference to receive the award.

Kupp was named a consensus first-team All-American, having been honored by the four major selectors at the FCS level, consisting of the American Football Coaches Association, the Associated Press, The Sports Network and the Walter Camp Football Foundation. Kupp is the first freshman wide receiver to be named as a first-team All-American since Randy Moss in 1996.

On January 9, 2014, Kupp was honored by the College Football Performance Awards with the 2013 FCS Wide Receiver Award. Kupp is the second straight Eagles wide receiver to win the award, following Brandon Kaufman, who won the 2012 award.

2014 season

Kupp finished his sophomore season with 104 catches for 1,431 yards and 16 touchdowns in 13 games. He was named a First-Team All-American by the AFCA, AP, and TSN for the second consecutive season. He was also named to the first team All-Big Sky Conference for the second straight year as a wide receiver while also earning third team honors as punt returner. Kupp finished 18th in the 2014 Walter Payton Award voting.

2015 season

In the 2015 season, Kupp finished the season with 114 catches for 1,642 yards and 19 touchdown in 11 games. Kupp broke the Big Sky single-season record for catches with 114, a total that ranks ninth most all-time in FCS single-season history. Kupp was named a first team All-Big Sky Conference wide receiver for the third-straight year and was also named the league's Offensive Most Valuable Player. He was just the second wide receiver to be named Big Sky Offensive MVP in the last 42 years. Kupp would also win the Walter Payton Award, becoming the third Eastern Washington player to win the award and only the second wide receiver to win, after Brian Finneran of Villanova in 1997.

2016 season

On November 30, 2015, Kupp announced that he would return for his senior season after speculation that he was considering entering the 2016 NFL Draft. He was poised to break nearly every major FCS career receiving record mark during his final collegiate season. At the end of his career, his 6,464 career receiving yards are most in FCS history, passing NFL Hall of Famer Jerry Rice, who had 4,693 at Mississippi Valley State from 1981–1984. Kupp’s 73 receiving touchdowns rank first in FCS history, passing the 58 touchdowns that New Hampshire's David Ball caught from 2003–2006.

College career statistics

All statistics from goeags.com

College awards & honors

Professional career

Kupp received an invitation to the NFL Combine and 2017 Senior Bowl and made two receptions for 14 receiving yards for the North, who lost 16-15 to the South. He attended the NFL Combine and completed all the combine drills except for the bench press. Kupp also attended Eastern Washington's Pro Day and chose to attempt all of the combine drills again, but opted to skip the bench press and broad jump. NFL Draft experts and analysts projected him to be a second or third round pick in the 2017 NFL draft.

Kupp was chosen by the Los Angeles Rams in the third round as the 69th overall pick of the 2017 NFL Draft. He formalized his association with the Rams by signing a contract on June 9, 2017.

On September 10, in his regular season debut against the Indianapolis Colts in Week 1, Kupp had four receptions for 76 yards and his first career touchdown, a 18-yard pass from quarterback Jared Goff.

Personal life

Kupp is the son of former National Football League quarterback Craig Kupp, a fifth-round draft pick by the New York Giants in 1990 out of Pacific Lutheran University who played for the Phoenix Cardinals and the Dallas Cowboys in 1991. He married Anna Croskrey on June 20, 2015.

His grandfather, Jake Kupp, was an offensive lineman for the University of Washington and was drafted in the ninth round of the 1964 NFL Draft by the Dallas Cowboys. He played from 1964–75 as a guard with Dallas, the Washington Redskins, Atlanta Falcons, and the New Orleans Saints. Named to the NFL All-Rookie team, he later was a five-time captain for the Saints. He was named to the franchise’s 25-year All-Time Team and was inducted into its Hall of Fame in 1991.