What WR Johntay Cook’s departure means for Texas

Culture means everything at a position easily filled through the NCAA transfer portal as high school wide receiver recruiting surges.

On Thursday morning, the news broke that Texas Longhorns sophomore wide receiver Johntay Cook is no longer with the program in a decision that head coach Steve Sarkisian described as “mutual” during his Thursday media availability.

“Obviously, we’ve had some roster movement today with Johntay Cook moving on. We have nothing but respect for he and his family. Wish him the best of luck in his future endeavors,” Sarkisian said in his introductory statement.

The departure, which Anwar Richardson of Orangebloods reported as a “dismissal” ends a once-promising career at Texas for Cook, a highly-touted recruit who finished the 2023 recruiting cycle as a consensus five-star prospect ranked as the No. 29 player nationally and the No. 3 wide receiver, according to the 247Sports Composite rankings.

Over 20 games with the Longhorns, Cook finished with 16 catches for 273 yards and two touchdowns — both coming against the Roadrunners this season — an average of 17.1 yards per reception that flashed the elite explosiveness that made Cook such a highly-coveted national prospect.

Here’s what his departure means for Texas and wide receivers coach Chris Jackson.

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The coaches didn’t trust Cook

It wasn’t just what Sarkisian said or didn’t say about Cook in public that presaged his departure, from talking about, “It will be critical to get Johntay going” during the bye week or failing to mention Cook among the group of promising young players who have been practicing well over the critical bye week.

It was that against Vanderbilt, when junior wide receiver Isaiah Bond was out with an ankle injury and consensus five-star signee Ryan Wingo suffered a minor, freak injury when he collided with a Commodores staffer before the game and only managed three catches for 20 yards, Cook still didn’t play.

Ultimately, the distinction between dismissed and a mutual parting of ways doesn’t matter, because if it’s mutual with a player who hasn’t been in any legal trouble and still has so much potential, it’s because of a lack of trust, a critical factor in a program with a prized culture that Sarkisian and his team leaders have worked hard to build.

To maintain that hard-won culture, it has to take precedent over potential.

Speaking of culture, let’s check in on Cook’s social media activity.

Okay, then. Moving on.

Five-star busts always matter

In a pure assessment of the current state of the wide receivers room, Cook’s departure after falling out of the rotation — he didn’t play against Georgia or Vanderbilt and only played four snaps in the blowout win over Oklahoma — will have little impact on the remainder of the season barring a number of injuries.

But five-star busts always matter. Cook still possesses all of the talent that made him a top-30 national prospect and should have every chance to find success at his next destination, so his loss is significant from a macro program perspective. In the 2023 recruiting class, there were only 39 consensus five-star prospects. Historically, around 50 percent of this players should land on NFL rosters — five-star prospects are rare, hard to land, and represent the most sure thing in high school football evaluations.

Since Sarkisian’s 2021 transition class that included one consensus five-star prospect in the nation’s No. 1 athlete, Denton Ryan’s Ja’Tavion Sanders, a fourth-round selection in this year’s NFL Draft, Texas signed two five-star prospects in the 2022 class (DJ Campbell and Kelvin Banks), four five-star prospects in the 2023 class (Arch Manning, Anthony Hill, CJ Baxter, and Cook), and four five-star prospects in the 2024 class (Colin Simmons, Brandon Baker, Kobe Black, and Xavier Filsaime). The 2025 class, relatively close to completion with 22 commits, has commitments from three five-star prospects — safety Jonah Williams, wide receiver Kaliq Lockett, and wide receiver Jaime Ffrench.

So that makes Cook the first five-star bust to sign with Sarkisian out of the 10 five-star prospects who inked with the fourth-year Texas head coach over his first three complete recruiting cycles.

The combination of relaxed NCAA transfer rules and NIL shortened the development timeline, especially for top recruits at a position like wide receiver that doesn’t require the physical maturity to play in the trenches at a high level, so it’s not surprising that Cook wants to use his two seasons of eligibility elsewhere having lost the chance to redshirt this season.

But, again, the new reality doesn’t diminish the impact of a five-star bust.

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In Wingo we trust

With the loss of Cook, Bond’s likely declaration for the 2025 NFL Draft, the potential that junior Matthew Golden will declare as well, and the exhaustion of Silas Bolden’s eligibility, Texas is going to lose at least two and maybe four of the six rotation receivers this season.

Even in the short term, the spotlight will turn more sharply towards Wingo. If Cook only showed flashes of his playmaking ability over 20 games with the Longhorns, Wingo already looks like a future star eight games in his career, leading the team in yards per reception at 17.26 and scoring two touchdowns. His speed, sure hands, and body control ensures that the ball both finds him on progression reads and that Sarkisian uses his considerable offensive acumen to design plays for Wingo to get the ball directly, like the 55-yard end around against Michigan.

While Cook was still firmly in the realm of unrealized potential, Wingo is realizing his quickly.

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Excellent portal and wide receiver recruiting

When Sarkisian hired Jackson away from the Jacksonville Jaguars less than two years ago to become his third wide receivers coach in three years, Sarkisian did so taking a calculated risk — Jackson had only spent one year as a wide receivers coach after two years as an assistant wide receivers coach and a year as a defensive assistant, a thin resume.

But Sarkisian’s track record hiring assistants is largely stellar and it’s worked out with Jackson, who was able to pull Wingo out of his home state of Missouri and sign three other wide receivers in the 2024 class. He also helped land Bond, Bolden, and Golden in critical additions from the transfer portal after helping to develop AD Mitchell into a second-round NFL Draft pick.

In the 2025 class, Jackson holds commitments from Lockett, the nation’s No. 16 prospect and No. 2 wide receiver, Ffrench, the No. 48 prospect and No. 9 wide receiver, and from Lucas Lovejoy’s Daylan McCutcheon, a recent Florida State flip who ranks as the No. 185 player and No. 19 wide receiver.

Even considering the miss on Duncanville’s Dakorien Moore, the nation’s top wide receiver and Oregon commit, the Texas wide receiver recruiting class in 2025 is elite and just short of an ideal and historic group.

And then there’s the portal — the Horns have made four key additions in the last two cycles at a position that generally features myriad talent, unlike positions in the trenches that require a rare baseline of size and athleticism.

There might not necessarily be a huge emphasis on wide receiver recruiting in the portal — the winter transfer window and NFL Draft decisions will bear that out in a few months — but all the signs indicate that Texas can both recruit high school wide receivers at a high level and land top talents in the portal who also fit the culture.

Onward.