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Cooke’s playing style earned him the reputation as one of the NHL’s “pests”. During his NHL career, Cooke was criticized and often suspended for hits, some involving head-shots, or knee-on-knee collisions that have injured opposing players. As a youth, Cooke played in the 1992 Quebec International Pee-Wee Hockey Tournament with the Quinte minor ice hockey team from Belleville, Ontario. Windsor Spitfires, prior to playing professionally.
Cooke with the Vancouver Canucks in 2007. 03 and earned the Fred J. Hume Award as the team’s unsung hero. Perhaps Cooke’s most memorable moment with the Canucks occurred during this stint on the first line as the Canucks entered the 2004 playoffs against the Calgary Flames. 05 NHL lockout, Cooke would play two more full seasons with the Canucks, scoring at a similar pace. Cooke with the Capitals, March 2008.
08 season, Cooke would play 17 games with the Capitals, scoring seven points. 4-million contract with the Pittsburgh Penguins. He injured his ribs in his first season with the Penguins in October, missing four games, but was able to return by the end of the month. Cooke set a new career high during the 2010 Stanley Cup Playoffs by scoring four post-season goals, two of those coming in the decisive Game 6 against the Ottawa Senators at Scotiabank Place.
5 million contract with the Minnesota Wild. 15 season, having appeared in just 29 regular season games, Cooke was placed on waivers in order to buy-out the final year of his three-year contract with the Wild on June 19, 2015. During his career, Cooke has been criticized by the media, league, fans, and team executives, and other players for his hitting in ways more likely to cause injury such as hits to the head. 09 season, with the Penguins, Cooke was suspended on two different occasions. On March 7, 2010, in a game against the Boston Bruins, Cooke delivered a blow to the head of Boston’s Marc Savard, concussing Savard and forcing him to miss almost two months. On February 9, 2011, Cooke was given a four-game suspension for a hit from behind on Columbus Blue Jackets’ defenceman Fedor Tyutin. With the suspension and then Pittsburgh’s early elimination from the playoffs, Cooke had a considerable amount of free time.