Jets rookie wide receiver Omar Cooper Jr. said he was poised and ready on Thursday morning for his first training camp encounter with the news media until a shrill fire alarm emptied the room for about 10 minutes.

Back on the podium after the brief interruption, Cooper didn't miss a beat as he calmly talked about making the leap from the college game to the NFL.

"Everybody is smarter," Cooper, 22, said. "I feel like a lot of people say speed and size, but I feel like at the end of the day, it's just football. But once you get to this level, you have players like Demario Davis, who's been in it for 15 years, and so he's calling out the plays. And so just a lot smarter people, people taking better angles, holes closing a lot faster, so just getting adjusted to that and being able to read it and be on the same page with the quarterback."

Asked in a follow-up question if the NFL game is faster physically or mentally, Cooper didn't hesitate: "Mentally."

For the second time since the 2022 NFL Draft, the Jets made three selections in this past April's first round -- edge David Bailey at No. 2 overall, TE Kenyon Sadiq at No. 16 and then Cooper at No. 30 after a trade with San Francisco to move back into the first round to land the versatile WR who helped Indiana to last season's national championship.

Cooper joins a promising wide receiver corps, which is led by Garrett Wilson and Adonai Mitchell, but offers opportunity in the offense being constructed by veteran coach Frank Reich. As promising a WR as Cooper certainly is, HC Aaron Glenn said on Thursday that as exciting the rookie crop appears, nothing is guaranteed.

"Well, the expectation is for all those guys to have a role, but they have to decide that themselves," Glenn said, speaking in general about his young players. "And you guys [reporters] have heard me say this before. I mean, we're out there trying to compete, and no one's given anything.

"So they determine that role. And I'm always honest with those guys in that aspect of listen, here's what we need you to do. Here's how you can do it, and here's how you got to compete to beat this guy out because that guy's not going to let you just have it. And I want to create that type of environment here. So, the expectations, yes, they have a big role, but they have to decide that themselves."

Cooper (6-0, 199) brings speed (4.42 in the 40 at the NFL Combine) with an ability to extend plays after making the catch. In the Hoosiers' 2025 title season, Cooper grabbed 69 passes for 937 yards (13.6 per catch) from QB Fernando Mendoza (the No. 1 overall draft pick), good for 13 TDs.

Thursday's session was only Day 2 of training camp, with no pads on until Monday's session next week. Still, Cooper said he's been slowly forging a rapport with veteran QB Geno Smith.

"It's been good so far," Cooper said. "Obviously, still working on it, which comes with practice. I feel like me and Geno, we're starting to slowly get on the same page, and there's times where I got to be a little faster. But just making sure that I'm going back to him, asking him questions, seeing what he likes, what he thinks I should do, that'll help it. So just making sure I'm on the same page with him."

The emergence of Mitchell during offseason workouts that impressed the coaches, plus the drafting of Cooper and Sadiq to go with the re-signing of RB1 Breece Hall (among others) has given Reich and the Jets' offense multiple options that will also serve to relieve the attention Wilson normally gets from the opposition. The room has gotten bigger. And that's a good thing.

"I'm very dynamic with the ball after the catch," Cooper said. "And then also I've been learning from Garrett and AD, so I feel like that's also making my game better. But then you got AD Mitchell, very fast guy, tough, can run routes, and so I feel like it makes it easier for Garrett. He won't have too much of the attention. But obviously, like I said earlier, you just got to continue putting in the work and grow. And so when the season comes, then we'll see how it really looks."