Hawkeye0202
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Part of it's technique, part of it's athletic ability. You need to have flexibility especially in your hips and ankles to cut hard and really break well, and that can't be taught.
These spider charts sum up the differences athletically pretty well. Cooper is fast and has great agility scores for his size (it's harder for tall players to cut as quickly as shorter ones). Dez was pretty stiff, but was huge and had unreal lower-body explosion that gave him his hops and some absolutely sick plant-and-go ability when he wanted to turn upfield for YAC.
https://www.mockdraftable.com/player/amari-cooper
https://www.mockdraftable.com/player/dez-bryant
The technique can be taught, but aside from differences in work ethic, it takes years to drill it down into muscle memory where you can do it without conscious effort. When you are gassed in the 4th, running a hurry-up two minute drill, and you see the QB throw the ball your way, you're not going to be thinking about your footwork drills.
Dez came out of a college Air Raid and had never really mastered the fundamentals by the time he left school. Coop went to Saban's NFL factory where they annually kick out players at all positions with military-grade technique (seriously - read the scouting reports this year. Jonah WIlliams? Great technique. Big Q? Great technique. Irv Smith? Great technique.), and he was no exception. So Coop came out with at least a 3 year head start on Dez technically.
It also comes down to a guy's mentality. Dez was always immature, but he was a freaking dawg when it came time to go up for a jump ball or bull a DB over for a first down. Coop doesn't have that same kind of fight in him, but I'll bet you $100 that he takes a lot better to coaching too.
This kinda begs the question ........Dez vs Michael Irvin. Similar physicality and built but miles apart in results.