You are partly right and partly wrong. As am I.
The NCAA limits the number of staff that are allowed to be off campus recruiting at one time. That limit is currently 7. Generally speaking, a school is not going to send someone who is not an on-field coach off campus to recruit unless they are short staffed. So, while you are right that Cooney doesn't need to be an on-field coach in order to conduct off-campus recruiting, the fact that he is, is still an indicator that we have not filled all of our offensive coaching positions. Once those positions are filled, it is highly unlikely that we will see Cooney accompanying coaches on off-campus recruiting trips going forward as that would mean we would have one less actual on-field coach that would be allowed to go off campus at that time. Generally speaking, that would be a disadvantage. However, I'm sure there may be some instances with specific recruits where it may be advantageous for Cooney to visit them instead of an on-filed coach because he may have a strong relationship with that recruit.