Cook placed on IR, could return

The Vikings put CB Chris Cook on injured reserve with a broken arm, but he could return if the Vikings make the playoffs. They are currently 5-3.

For the third straight season, Chris Cook won’t be playing a full season.

Cook suffered a broken right arm Thursday night in the Vikings’ 36-17 loss to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.

Cook left the field holding his arm during Tampa Bay’s first possession of the second half and went to the locker room for X-rays. Leslie Frazier initially believed the wrist was broken, but he clarified Friday it was the arm.

The Vikings placed him on injured reserve and designated him for return if the Vikings make the playoffs. Doctors estimated a seven- to eight-week recovery.

Frazier said Cook was "distraught" over the injury.

Cook entered the game with 27 tackles, a sack and a team-leading 11 passes defensed. He was credited with three tackles Thursday night before leaving the game.

"I thought he was really coming along and he had a good game yesterday in the time that he was out there," Frazier said. "He was playing well for us so it’s unfortunate.”

The 2010 second-round draft choice started five of the six games he played as a rookie, but he missed 10 games with a torn meniscus in both knees. He injured the right knee in the preseason, missing the first two regular-season games, and then tore the meniscus in the left knee in the third game. He started four straight games from Week 6-10, but eventually “dull pain” and inflammation in the surgically repaired knees ended his rookie campaign.

In 2011, he started three of the first six games, but after his arrest for domestic assault, the Vikings suspended him for one game and made him active for the rest of the season.

This year he had started the first eight games before his broken arm on the Buccaneers first drive of the second half.

Cook was starting to earn the trust of teammates with his improved play this season.

“I think a lot of people have always thought Chris has so much ability, and once he got over that being-young thing, now he’s really come into his own and he’s a mature leader on this team and especially in this defense,” linebacker Chad Greenway said last week. “A guy you can count on and a guy who can go out there with his size and match up with anybody.”

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