Cowboys' 1st-round rookie working to flatten learning curve of life in NFL

USA Today

5 hours ago

Cowboys' 1st-round rookie working to flatten learning curve of life in NFL
To go from college ball to the NFL, there is famously a huge learning curve. But Cowboys first-round draft pick Tyler Booker is working to do to that curve what he's done to defensive linemen throughout his playing career.
Flatten it.
With teams still in the obligatory non-contact phase of their offseason program, though, the massive six-foot-five guard has had to rely on something other than his 320-pound frame to get himself acclimated to playing at the professional level.
"The more you know football," the just-turned-21-year-old said this week, "the slower the game becomes."
Booker is getting crash-course tutoring these days from his offensive linemates in Dallas.
"I couldn't ask for a better room of vets," he explained. "We're a younger room, but there's still a lot of experience within there."
That part is debatable. The presumed starting five all obviously have more playing time under their belts than Booker, but the overall youth clearly stands out.
Undrafted right tackle Terence Steele is 28 years old and suddenly the group's elder statesman, with 74 career starts. Tyler Smith, Tyler Guyton, and Cooper Beebe are all 24 and have 47, 11, and 16 starts, respectively.
Put another way, the front five's combined 148 starts (to date) are still shy of the just-retired Zack Martin's 162.
The Cowboys O-line is indeed a young bunch, and they're still very much figuring out how they'll gel. Booker may be the fresh-faced rookie, but he's making sure he's not the weak link.
"We're building great chemistry," he said. "If I ever have a question right before the snap, they're able to help me out and lead me in the right direction. But I'm trying to make sure that that doesn't become a habit. I'm very prideful in knowing the offense, and I want to make sure I'm not holding this room back by any means."
Booker believes his collegiate tenure at one of the country's most rigorous football programs gives him something of a head start in that regard. He said that the Cowboys' minicamp last week- although notoriously challenging for some rookies, given the hands-off rules that severely limit what linemen can do- was not unlike what he experienced in Tuscaloosa, explaining, "We were still out there going against each other without helmets."
And the first-team All-American pointed to a lengthy list of mentors he's been exposed to along the way, dating all the way back to high school.
In addition to Nick Saban, Kalen DeBoer, and Crimson Tide assistants Eric Wolford and Chris Kapilovic, Booker rattled off names like George Hegamin, the former Cowboy who was a key backup during the Super Bowl dynasty days, and three-time Pro Bowler Tra Thomas, who, he noted with a knowing smile, "played for another team in the NFL." Both O-line veterans coached him at IMG Academy in Florida.
He also shouted out JC Latham, his linemate in both high school and college, who was a first-round draft pick last year for the Tennessee Titans. Booker called Latham his "best friend" and said he's helping him adjust to his first offseason in the pros.
Picking up little things from all of them," Booker allowed, "has definitely contributed to my football IQ."
Which brings us back to the original problem: flattening out that rookie learning curve so he can make an immediate impact with the new-look 2025 Cowboys.
For now, it's a challenge that Booker, who graduated from 'Bama in just three years, is happy to attack mentally, with a little help from his (slightly more) experienced teammates and his formidable Rolodex of football mentors.
"The speed of the game, it's so sped up from college to the NFL," he said. "So, them telling me to see the whole picture and be like, 'Okay, obviously you have to see the three-technique or the two in front of you. Well, where's that linebacker aligned? Where's that safety aligned? What's going on on the other side? How is that end playing T.Steele?' Those are all things I have to take into account pre-snap, and the more reps I get during minicamp and OTAs, the more I start to see the whole picture, and that's definitely helped me improve to this point."
But just wait until the pads go on in Oxnard and the linemen can actually hit each other. That's when the gargantuan Booker can start physically wrestling that sizable learning curve into submission.
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