When it comes to this small-town sports hero from Yakima, Washington - 'you can't root against Cooper Kupp'

Always overlooked, Kupp has constantly proven doubters wrong, and now the NFL's offensive player of the year at wide receiver will lead the Los Angeles Rams in Super Bowl LVI on Sunday.

Editor's note: SBLive contributor Jerrel Swenning just finished a 17-year run as the Yakima Herald-Republic sports editor, and has wealth of knowledge and background of the area in which NFL star wide receiver Cooper Kupp grew up and played high school football and basketball.

YAKIMA - As first impressions go, there wasn’t much to Cooper Kupp.

The then-teenage football hopeful certainly didn’t look like he’d cause many high school defensive coordinators from the central Washington-based Big Nine any lost sleep, let alone someone destined to become NFL’s offensive player of the year as a wide receiver for 2021 after winning the "triple crown" (receiving yards and touchdowns, and receptions) in helping the Los Angeles Rams earn the NFC’s spot in Super Bowl LVI on Sunday.

But that’s what makes his journey to stardom so appealing. He’s the embodiment of every sappy proverb – "it’s not the size of the dog in the fight" … "you can’t judge a book" … "hard work beats talent" – with an attitude betraying the sport’s diva position.

More than a dozen years ago, Craig Kupp brought his eldest child to the Yakima Herald-Republic offices for ‘mug day’ – a Sunday afternoon in late August when 7-12 players from areas high school teams have their mugshots snapped for the season preview and the fall campaign.

When the Kupps arrived, two thoughts came to mind:

1. What are the Tri-Cities teams, Wenatchee and Moses Lake gonna do to a receiver that was listed generously at 150 pounds (he must’ve been weighed in full gear while shouldering a loaded backpack)?

2. Why is dad smiling (it turns out Craig is almost always smiling) while offering up his son to a rugged league on a perpetual also-ran Davis High School team that finished winless the prior season?

The genes in the younger Kupp – the same that made grandpa Jake a longtime NFL offensive lineman and member of the New Orleans Saints Hall of Fame and dad a record-setting quarterback at Pacific Lutheran University – were as of yet unpronounced.

The only jeans evident that day were the pair hiding half of the number on his two-sizes-too-big tucked-in jersey.

Year by year, however, he grew both physically and statistically, helping the Pirates to their first back-to-back winning football seasons in more than 40 years and the school’s first state basketball championship in 47 seasons - all with an endless humility.

When he and a few other of the Pirates' key seniors were featured in the Herald-Republic’s center spread of the football preview, he called the newspaper’s office to make sure all of Davis’ 12th-graders were noted.

That modesty coupled with tenacity is why Yakima, a town full of rabid Seahawks fans, is embracing a player from a rival NFC West team. You can’t root against Cooper Kupp.

Oh, people have tried. When Kupp scorched Washington State University for 206 receiving yards and three touchdowns in Eastern Washington University's upset of the Cougars on Labor Day weekend in 2016, he made the already arduous drive from Pullman to Yakima unbearable.

Yet, all one at-the-time sports editor could muster was "dammit, Leach," bemoaning WSU coach Mike Leach for his defensive scheme and the scholarship offer he hadn’t made to a certain Yakima receiver.

After a brilliant career at EWU, and armloads of awards and records, Kupp was again in the NFL skeptics’ crosshairs – too small, lower level of competition, mediocre time in the 40-yard dash. Every team passed on him at least once in the NFL Draft until the Rams scooped him up in the third round.

Five seasons into a pro career having just earned his first All-Pro designation and at the cusp of a championship, he’s shed more doubters.

Craig and wife Karin Kupp arrived with family in Los Angeles on Wednesday. She’s hoping her husband will eat something on gameday as despite his good-naturedness and the family’s enduring faith, the nerves still get to him.

Hopefully those receded a bit Thursday when Cooper Kupp won the NFL's top offensive player award, and garnered an MVP vote. One victory down, and favored to add another Sunday.

From an athlete who looked a better fit for cross country to Super Bowl champion. That would be quite the feat.

So much for first impressions.

(All photos courtesy of Craig and Karin Kupp)