It's been a busy last couple of days for new Cowboys acquisition Ryan Cook. After playing the Cowboys on Wednesday this week, the Dolphins plane was stuck for a couple of hours at DFW airport after it clipped another plane's tail with its wing, forcing both planes out of service and prolonging the team's return. Dolphins player tweets indicate that some players arrived home as late/early as 8:00 am ET on Thursday morning.
Late on Thursday evening, the Cowboys traded for the offensive lineman, and Cook found himself back on a plane to Dallas on Friday, where he spent most of the day working to get acquainted with the new offense.
Today, he had his first practice with his new teammates and talked to the DFW media in the locker room afterwards. And as you'll see from the transcript of the interview after the break, Cook is excited to be in Dallas and is already working hard on learning the offense.
In his one year in Miami, Cook has played center almost exclusively for the Dolphins, but had experience in Minnesota at center, both guard positions and even right tackle. Under new coach Joe Philbin, the Dolphins are moving away from their previous power-blocking identity and becoming more of a zone-running team, and Ryan Cook found himself one of the odd men out in the new system.
Cook is expected to provide competition for Phil Costa, the incumbent center, but should also provide depth, size and muscle at the guard positions: The Cowboys officially list Cook at 6-6 and 325 pounds.
This is a transcript from the video of the interview on the mothership.
Q: Are you excited about the move to Dallas?
Cook: "Yeah, I am excited about it. It’s a fresh start for me. I had a good time while I was in Miami but now I’m excited to be a Dallas Cowboy."
Q: When you played that last game, did you have the feeling that you may be auditioning for someone else?
Cook: "You know, in the preseason you're always auditioning. No matter where you are, you never know how the roster’s going to shape up. It's always kind of an evolving-type situation. So you just go out there and do the best that you can and hope that somebody sees you."
Q: How quickly can you pick things up, and how much have you been in the iPad already?
Cook: "Well, I was here yesterday most of the day. I'm picking up on some of the terms in the terminology. I think for me that's the biggest thing right now, the difference in terminology and what it means. The plays and offense are something I'm fairly familiar with."
Q: How much have you played center and how comfortable are you in that spot?
Cook: "I played center for the last year and a half. While I was in Miami that was strictly my position – center. But I’ve played multiple positions when I was with Minnesota. Center, right guard, right tackle, left guard. So I’m fairly comfortable with them."
Q: Did they make it clear to you they want you to push for a starting job?
Cook: "They didn't really say one way or another be honest with you. Obviously that's my goal, to go out there and vie for a starting position. And keep working towards that."