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I have to give this some serious thought today as OU is holding a presser later today at Gaylord Memorial Stadium to discuss Lincoln Riley’s sketchty exit from one of the iconic programs in the country to basically avoid coaching in the big boy SEC conference.

I never booed Kevin. I never will. His exit to leave the Thunder I can defend to a certain extent because Kevin stayed with the Thunder for a decade, endured Russell Westbrook’s worst inner basketball instincts for that same period of time, and had to come to the final realization Sam Hinkie-Presti was never going to add a shooting guard to the team who could actually shoot a basketball.

So Kevin left to join the Warriors and the rest is basketball history as Kevin with the Splash Brothers won two rings and two MVP Finals trophies.

I defend Kevin’s decision on my blog now although at the beginning I’ll admit I was stung by his decision.

I’m not at all stunned Lincoln is headed to USC. In fact…I actually recommended he take the job several weeks ago after the pathetic performance in Waco after having two weeks to prepare for that game.

Like Dennis Dodd wrote this morning…even in today’s world… hedge fund managers usually at the least give two weeks notice, but not the case with Lincoln Riley. It is what it is. But he’s still not a traitor in the world of college football. Just a survivor.

Here’s another thing….Kevin was a free agent and fulfilled his contract to the extent of what he signed on for in Oklahoma City. His decision was based on the fact he didn’t think Sam Hinkie-Presti had the overall breadth as a general manager to reign in Russell Westbrook and put a championship roster together in Oklahoma City.

Not the case with Lincoln. He just doesn’t want to play Georgia, Alabama, LSU and the rest of the SEC underworld. He and his agent would like to moetize the next twenty years to the max. Lincoln was 1-3 verus the SEC and his only win came against a Florida team coached by Dan Mullen which was missing the heart of its lineup in the Cotton Bowl.

As far as Kevin in basketball historical hindsight …. Kevin was absolutely correct in that Sam Hinkie-Presti appears to still not get it as far as the fact you actually need some players on your team who can shoot a basketball.

Now to Lincoln Riley’s sketchy exit to USC. I think SoCal is a fascinating iconic program with a lit fight song and beautiful cheerleaders. I’m fine with him leaving because in all candor I don’t think Lincoln has the overall mental toughness to coach in the SEC week to week. He’s a young head coach never took a job like Matt Campbell at Iowa State did and then made it respectable.

He never had to do what Shane Beamer just did at South Carolina by turning a 2-8 type program into a bowl eligible 6-6 team in one year.

He never had to do what Mark Stoops has done at Kentucky with a program and culture overall to be a competitive 9-3 team in the SEC.

He never had to do what Bob Stoops did in 1999 when he inherited the OU program from John Blake.

Now here’s what I’m going to do. I have to take my lab Pauli to the vet this morning. I’m going to halt this post right now for the time being.

I’m back.

So what did Lincoln Riley inherit at OU from Bob Stoops and Joe C?

He inherited a program which in 2016 made the College Football Playoff and had Baker Mayfield at QB with Kyler Murray redshirting after his transfer from Texas A&M.

He had the triumvirate of David Boren, Joe C, and Bob Stoops to lead him and at the same time make sure the program was intact.

This is where my word usage is critical. Do I think Lincoln Riley is a traitor?

No.. I do not. I think Lincoln is a calculating coach who inherited a plum job at OU whose teams at OU have played soft for the most part when they’ve played against teams with equal or better talent.

You could say Lincoln is a bit soft and has had a protected coaching environment in Norman, But I’m not calling him a traitor. In this world of college football Bin Laden wouldn’t be a traitor.

This is the critical part in evaluating Lincoln’s exit and eventual legacy. During his time in Norman he’s only been an underdog in two road games. The 2017 game in Columbus and this past Saturday when his team was a 4.5 road underdog in Stillwater.

Keep this in mind as well… Lincoln and Coach Luke at Cincy have the same agent. Surely this agent isn’t going to double down and now bring Coach Luke to Norman? Think about and how dirty college football has become.

Another reason I’m not calling anybody a traitor is OU can’t in any way question someone else’s loyalty after what just happened with the SEC move.

The current world of college football is a dog eat dog business. Survival of the fittest. Coach Luke at Cincy, although not on my list is someone we need to be watching this week as the college football four team bracket is announced. This is better than Al Pacino taking Willie Beamon with him to his new job and basically telling Cameron Diaz to stick it between her legs.

So in reality it’s better Joe C found this out now rather than later. OU needs to have a coach in place by Saturday morning is my take. Maybe schedule the presser right before Gameday before the conference championship games. Control the national narrative to recruits across the country. So right there you have to figure maybe Luke Ficknell at Cincy may not be in play at this juncure and that’s why I haven’t listed him as of yet. I believe every other coach I mentioned save Dave Arvanda at Baylor isn’t playing on Championship Saturday. Plus, Alex Grinch will be announced as the new defensive coordinator at USC later today.

So in the end will I classify Lincoln Riley as a cupcake or a traitor? No. Neither. Of course not. He’s a calculated opportunist…pretty much like everyone else in college football.

But by the same token Lincoln Riley will never be considered an iconic coach at OU. Oklahoma is the one program in the country which has had four different coaches pass the 100-win plateau. Those names being Owens, Wilkinson, Switzer, and Stoops.

Lincoln’s place in OU football history will fall behind Chuck Fairbanks who coached OU to the ’71 Game of the Century vs. Nebraska then followed that with a Big 8 championship in ’72 before taking the New England job in the NFL.

Will this last long with me as far as Lincoln leaving OU?

It won’t affect me at all and like I’ve written on here I think it would be wise to hire someone who at the very least who has been a coordinator in the SEC.

If Joe C and Bob Stoops had just moved to USC with Lincoln…then I’d be in a very concerned state of mind this morning.

Coach Stoops, would you please do something for me? Please call Joe Brady and explain to him how special it is to coach football at OU….even if only as one of the highest paid coordinators in the country.

I’m disappointed Lincoln didn’t give the SEC a chance, but maybe this tells us something about his competitive soul or therein lack of. And if you don’t posess an alpha competitive soul you shouldn’t be coaching in the SEC.

So in closing…no traitors, no cupcakes, just the world we live in.

Life moves on. Que sera.

BOOMER!

The answer to my question is that I don’t think he would leave Arizona. He would be stupid at this point to leave his NFL job. His team is 9-2 and he’s probably headed for NFL Coach of the Year. He has a young quarterback in Kyler Murray who believes in him as a coach. It doesn’t get much better than that.

The Cardinal roster is loaded, but most of all Arizona doesn’t play in the SEC West. Plus, he can redo his contract and leverage OU’s interest in him to get more money from the Cardinals. Pretty much what Lincoln Riley just did with LSU to get his deal with USC.

In Kliff Kingsbury’s six years as the head coach at Texas Tech he wasn’t very successful coaching in the Big 12. What would make anyone think Kliff Kingsbury woud be the guy to lead the Sooners charge in the SEC?

It makes no sense to me from the perspective of either party.

Joe Brady makes more sense to me. Is it risky? Well, yeah I guess. He’s never been a head coach. But Switzer was never a head coach previous to OU. Bob Stoops was never a head coach previous to OU. Nor was the East Carolina miracle Lincoln Riley a head coach previous to OU. Nor was Mike Gundy a head coach previous to Oklahoma State.

You turn Joe Brady loose at a presser with a highlight screen of Joe Burrow’s 2019 highlights playing in the background and what you’ll have is called ‘Winning a Press Conference.”

Cut a deal to keep Bob around the first two years as the associate head coach and give it a roll.

Kliff Kingsbury….no. Joe Brady… possibly.

Here’s Joe Brady again before the 2019 season at LSU. Joe Brady is from the Sean Payton tree with the Saints, ran perhaps the most prolific offense in college football history, and now finds himself going nowhere with the NFL Panthers with an aging Cam Newton as his quarterback. Tell me these stars don’t align in harmony.

Tell me Caleb Williams, his father, and Joe Brady weren’t made for one another. Tell me that and I’ll stop this, Joe C.

I would answer yes. At the minimum the next Sooner coach should be at home with what it takes to be a consistent winner in the toughest football conference in the country.

And quite frankly…I think that’s one of the reasons Lincoln Riley is leaving the Sooners so as to avoid the weekly physical grind of the SEC.

So if we agree on this let’s start making a list:

1 Mark Stoops current head coach at Kentucky. 2 Lane Kiffin current head coach at Ole Miss. 3 Joe Brady 2019 offensive coordinator LSU-current offensive coordinator Carolina Panthers. 4 Mike Leach—current head coach Miss State. 5 Shane Beamer-former assistant OU-current head coach South Carolina. 6 Sam Pittman-former assistant Georgia-current head coach Arkansas. 7 Josh Huepel- current head coach Tennessee-former OU QB and offensive coordinator.

Take your pick. Joe Brady is thirty-five and the next Lincoln Riley hire only with a better resume than Lincoln Riley had when he landed the OU job.

Sam Pittman…a grizzled SEC veteran coach who has turned the Hogs into a respectable group with an emphasis on toughness and physicality. Both qualities so clearly lacking from this year’s Oklahoma team.

Lane Kiffin… the once assistant to Saban who has done an excellent job at Ole Miss.

Shane Beamer… the current Gamecock head coach who dazzled at OU as an up and comer as the special teams coach. Does anybody doubt his past value at that post after witnessing OU’s special team play last night.

Mike Leach—the mad scientist of the Air Raid offense who started his college career at Kentucky as an assistant and is the current Miss State Bulldog head coach.

Mark Stoops…younger brother of Bob who has turned Kentucky into a respectable SEC football program.

And the irony hire…Josh Heupel…who was dismissed as offensive coordinator at OU to accomodate Lincoln Riley’s ascension to the Sooner throne.

There you go…there’s seven current coaches with viable SEC coaching experience who I think at the least would be interested in talking to Joe C about how they would envision the future of the Sooners if they were the head coach in Norman.

Let’s skip the presser from last night and move back five years ago when Lincoln Riley took the OU job.

I would guess OU didn’t want to match the USC offer or the LSU offer and I’d also guess that Lincoln knew it was going to be much tougher being the OU coach in the SEC than the Big 12 or the PAC-12.

From his own financial standpoint this was the time to do this with his value still high as he was the fifth highest paid coach in the country heading into this season.

Here’s what I wonder though because I heard Bob Stoops doing an interview last week on Lincoln possibly leaving for another job. Bob said he was convinced Lincoln Riley would be the coach taking the Sooners into the SEC.

And on this video here’s Lincoln crying just in appreciation of his relationship with Bob Stoops as his mentor.

I’ll be interested to hear from Bob Stoops at his presser if Lincoln confided in him as he contemplated taking the USC job.

Lincoln was a cryer back then that’s for certain. I may have to put my William Hurts Broadcast News fake crying scene back up on here.

You know…Mike Gundy for all his faults except when he was trying to leverage Boone with the Tennessee and Arkansas jobs stayed the course with his school. Which is kind of cool when you think about it.

Chris Jackson asked me a great OU trivia football question the other day. That being, Dad, in your lifetime has an OU football head coach quit the OU job to take another head coaching job at another school?

And the answer is no. Gomer Jones was fired. Jim McKinzie died of a heart attack. Chuck Fairbanks left in 1972, but that was to become the head coach of the New England Patriots. Barry Switzer after sixteen glorious seasons was forced to step down. Gary Gibbs was fired. Howard Snellenberger and his party animal wife Beverly were fired after one year. John Blake lasted four years before being fired. Bob Stoops after eighteen great seasons gracefully passed the torch to a then 34 year-old Lincoln Riley who was so moved by this he had to halt his press conference due to crying.

I’m not stunned he’s leaving, but I am a little stunned he wasn’t more accomodating to both Joe C and Bob Stoops. Boren was the president then…so I don’t blame Lincoln Riley there, but still these guys went out on a huge limb for a young Lincoln Riley. They in essense had to reassign Josh Huepel to make this work at OU for Lincoln. And as I recall Boren’s niece was married to Josh Heupel.

And now what we’ll probably see is OU’s roster and recruiting class of 2022 assaulted by the departure of Riley to USC.

That’s why there has to be a hire fairly quickly. And a splash hire which shows OU is still a top six job….which it is for the right coach.

I even wonder at this point if Matt Ruhle with the Carolina Panthers would have any interest in leaving the pros and coming back to the college game like Nick Saban did before taking the Alabama job.

I wonder if Matt Ruhle and Joe Brady if in any way could be persuaded to take a look at the OU job as a package deal.

That would be a splash hire. That would be what is called winning the press conference cycle and making a statement.

2019…Joe Brady at Frank Broyles Award Show. This is the coach who turned LSU’s vanilla offense into a national championship monster with only an average defense per LSU standards.

As usual…none of the Oklahoma writers ever mentioned USC and were fixated with Lincoln going to Baton Rouge.

Lincoln can be the college version of Bill Walsh out there and not have to feed the OU monster in the SEC.

Interesting stuff in Norman.

Well, this doesn’t surprise me at all. In fact… I mentioned it as a possibility three weeks ago on my little blog here when all this LSU bullshit started surfacing. Why would a young guy like Lincoln Riley put his coaching career in a coaching career meat grinder when the USC job hadn’t been filled all this time since the dismissal of Clay Helton.

I like Lincoln. I think for the most part he did an excellent job minus this season. And now it all makes sense why the team looked so ill-prepared for both Baylor and Oklahoma State with so many penalties and mental errors. Lincoln had his mind elsewhere.

I’m excited for Lincoln and I’m excited to see who the longterm replacement is Joe C is going to hire at OU. Maybe Bob will coach a year or two and hire Joe Brady as his coordinator with the thought Joe could be a head coach at some point. Kind of like the process went with Lincoln.

If I understand this correctly Bob Stoops will immediately become the interim coach and I think that’s awesome because Bob is too young to be retired from my perspective. Maybe Bob at some point will replace Joe C as the athletic director.

It was Joe C and Bob who actually together made the Lincoln Riley hire and in a sense forced Sooner favorite son Josh Heupel to become a head coach elsewhere.

If you study the history of OU head football coaches they usually come from coordinators making their first splash as a head coach.

Bud Wilkinson came here as an assistant. Chuck Fairbanks came here as an assistant. Same with Barry Switzer. Gary Gibbs was Switzer’s defensive coordinator. Bob Stoops came to OU after being defensive coordinator at both K State and Florida. Lincoln was Bob’s last offensive coordinator.

OU is heading to the SEC in two years and they just lost their quarterback coach, offensive coordinator, and head coach. Not a good look for recruits.

But the not the end of the world either for a program like OU.

Here’s a name which could possibly make sense…Joe Brady. Beyond my list of Dave Aranda, Matt Campbell, and Shane Beamer let’s add Joe Brady to out list. Coach Brady is the former LSU offensive coordinator for the Joe Burrow national championship team which destroyed OU two years ago in the national semi-finals.

He’s now the offensive coordinator for former Baylor coach Matt Ruhle with the Carolina Panthers. Very interesting..

That’s a thought which needs a little more research.

This is why I didn’t post Lincoln’s presser last night. It didn’t seem right when Kerry Murdoch asked Lincoln that sequence of questions related to Lincoln leaving for the LSU job.

I’m not saying Lincoln just openly purjured himelf, but you could tell there was something there…just not at LSU.

Kind of like when Inspector Clouseau asked the innkeeper if his dog bites and the owner said no.

Then of course Clouseau tried to pet the dog and the dog mauled Clouseau’s hand.

Clouseau screamed, “I thought you said your dog doesn’t bite?”

Then the owner cooly replied, “He’s not my dog.”

That’s what Lincoln Riley just did.

It’ll be interesting to see at Lincoln’s presser if Willie Beamon is heading to USC with him.

I never booed Kevin Durant and I certainly will never talk down about Lincoln. If I had two young kids and made that kind of money…Southern California wouldn’t be a bad place to coach.

It was a memorable day of college football. On Rivalry Saturday… Ohio State, Oklahoma, and almost Alabama were eliminated from College Football’s Four Team Playoff.

If you include Clemson’s demise this season and the thought Georgia will eliminate Alabama next Saturday in Atlanta—then what the world of college football will have is a four team playoff minus the Big Four of college ball for the first time since the Playoff was created.

That .5 of the 4.5 Vegas spread proved to be prescient for those of us who held out to the last minute as Oklahoma State survived a wobbly almost surreal third period and beat the Sooners 37-33 to advance to their first ever Big 12 Championship Game at Jerry’s World.

The first half ended in a 24-24 tie as OU showed the college football world this O State defense shouldn’t be mentioned in the same breath with the one in Georgia, but in the end this Sooner team which never once in this twelve game season showed they could play sixty minutes of football without dismantling itself with an erray of penalties, miscues, and self inflicted wounds… finally killed itself with an Eric Gray muffed punt near its own goaline to hand the Cowboys their first Bedlam win in Stillwater since 2011.

Almost like Alabama did earlier at Auburn in the final minute of regulation—Caleb Williams almost had another miracle to save the Sooners’ season. But in the end it wasn’t to be as the Cowboys held on and the fans stormed the field at Boone Pickens’ Stadium.

To the Cowboys’ credit they didn’t quit after they basically tried to hand the game to OU in the opening minutes of the second half with two fumbles on their own goalline which led to a safety and then a touchdown from former John Marshall Bear Justin Broiles.

The fact OU didn’t fall on both of those fumbles for 14 points versus 9 points in reality was probably key to O State ending the Sooners’ six year run as conference champs.

Some will say O State’s defense stiffled the Sooners’ offense in the second half. I didn’t really see it at that way though. It was the same array of Sooner dysfunction we witnessed all season long beginning with Tulane in Norman and ending with Mike Gundy’s overacheiving Cowboys finally slaying the hated Sooners in the house that Boone built..

I thought the most clever comment of the night came from me to my son Chris on the phone after the game when I asked, “You really think those idiots at LSU are willing to pay $12 million a year for this bullshit?”

Chris didn’t dignify that with a reply instead taking the high ground and ignoring the comment.

Then I amazed myself by adding former OU assistant and current South Carolina head coach Shane Beamer to Joe C’s list while scratching the unstable Mike Leach from our coach search list.

For Mike Gundy the former part-time Boone Pickens tormentor and Mullet King of college football it was a night of human redemption which probably hasn’t been rivaled since Norman Dale played by Gene Hackman in Hoosiers won the Indiana state high school championship.

Word has it a book and then maybe a subsequent Netflix movie could be in the works documenting this magical season for Oklahoma State.

Up next will be Dave Aranda’s Baylor Bears at Jerry’s World. I’d say Vegas will probably have O State as a 6.5 favorite to win their first ever Big 12 Championship since the game was put in place.

As far as me…I’ll be at a watch party with two of my nephews who live in Stillwater. The older one was the one who played with Gavin Gundy. Noah hopefully will keep me somewhat grounded as I redo the final two chapters.

Somewhere up in college football heaven both Boone Pickens and my old friend Dan Jenkins surely have a smile on their faces.

Mike Gundy finally rang the bell.

I love these kids. I never knew it started with American Idol.

Let’s go. I’ve got to hurry to beat the 11:00am first kickoff.

Just had my customary Gameday breakfast steak and eggs. I wanted to wait as long as possible to see if the Bedlam spread would move some more and it did. Holy shit…the Sooners are getting 4.5. This spread has literally moved six points since last Sunday on this game. The markets are bullish on the former Mullet King.

Reece Davis compared Gundy to Charlie Brown this morning as far his bleak Bedlam record, but here’s the thing… OU doesn’t have a Heisman finalist under center tonight. But still…4.5 and OU is hard not to take. Last time I can remember the Sooners being this big of a road dog in a regular season game was when the Sooners went up to Columbus and beat Kirk’s Buckeyes by dougle digits and Baker planted the flag.

I wouldn’t advise anyone planting any flags tonight though. In my younger days under the influnce of a few beers I might have pissed on that poser ‘1945 National Championship’ banner they have hung in the east endzone in the post game revelry. I’m way too old for that now.

Unless there’s an injury I’m unaware of beyond DJ Graham… I have to take the Sooners and the points.

I’m also taking Tulsa on the road versus SMU and the 7 points.

At the end last week I took the Buckeyes versus Michigan’s State’s putrid pass defense, gave the 19 and salavaged my week.

I’m taking the Buckeyes again today -6 on my two point bonus game. I now stand 14-16 versus the spread this topsy turvy season….still five points behind the streaking Chris Jackson who also took the Buckeyes in his bonus game last week.

You’ll notice I don’t have Auburn listed as any kind of upset special. I wanted to just for the sake of competitive drama, but I just can’t push that War Eagle button after the last two weeks. I’ve actually started to like Saban and quite frankly I’ll rooting for the Tide today…but in no way would I give 20 points on the road in this storied rivalry. Day I …Saban would give us more credibility as a democracy than Trump ever did ….not even close….plus, I like Saban’s wife—she’d make a great First Lady.

Gundy is a 4.5 favorite in Bedlam… I bet he’s shitting in his pants right now. That’s a lot for 1-19 Mike Gundy to be digesting internally right now. Gonna be lots of really angry Cowboys if Gundy can’t win as a 4.5 home favorite in the biggest game of his coaching career.

BOOMER!

No more communication for me with the outside world until these three games today have concluded.

You have to understand this…I Bleed Crimson. My son Chris is a complete OU lunatic. He traveled to every road game and bowl game during his four undergraduate years minus the two games in Ames. My wife is an Auburn War Eagle. Plus, there’s a plethora of O State supporters in the family landscape. Tomorrow is a big day for them…a reckoning of sorts. So for me tomorrow is the best day of the college football season with Kirk’s surging Buckeyes at Michigan.

Then we get the Iron Bowl with Alabama’s uncharacteristicly soft defense at Auburn versus the mercurial Bo Nix. Bo Nix is the ultimate wildcard…you never know with that kid. He runs like Caleb and when he gets hot…he can play a little bit. Kid is tough as nails. I might put Alabama on mini upset alert just prior to kick-off.

I’m ready for Saban to retire and seek the GOP nomination so the country can be saved from Trump and clueless idiots like Kyle Rittenhouse in 2024. Mike Pence and Mitt Romney are only still breathing because Kyle Rittenhouse couldn’t get to D.C. in time on January 6th. Just saying. I’m to assume in the world of Tucker Carlson and those lost souls who follow him they’ve never heard of reckless endangerment and manslaughter as punishable offenses in our system of law.

Isn’t it ironic that the party of fervent pro-lifers could care less about the sanctity of life if people are at a political rally or protest which doesn’t coincide with their beliefs. Then the sanctity of life for all grown up walking talking fetuses doesn’t carry all that much sway. Ironic…isn’t it.

I may have to squeeze in a special Smerconish Saturday at some point to address Kyle Rittenhouse and those which excuse his behavior…. but not tomorrow.

But I have to say as an honors graduate of the Bob Jackson School of Criminal Law the verdicts didn’t suprise me given the poor job the proscecutors did and the fact they didn’t try the case in a different venue with a different jury pool where maybe they would have had a chance to convict this person of something.

It all begins with jurisdiction, venue, voir dire, and the hope you can sell your case to a jury which is sympathetic to your client. In this case….Kyle’s lawyer Mark Richards had a client which appealed to this jury. Just a wild guess, but I’m guessing OJ Simpson and George Floyd wouldn’t have appealed as much to this group of jurors. BTW…I thought Tucker Carlson was prescient in hiring Richards as Kyle’s lawyer. The guy is a good lawyer. A formidable advocate. Bob would be saying Mark Richards is a rising star in a courtroom. I’m sure he’ll have a book out soon on this case.

But back to football. Three great games with Bedlam closing the show with the entire nation watching tomorrow.

I can’t imagine Lincoln and Caleb are all that nervous. If they lose they can say adios, let the LSU crazies pay OU the $25 million for the buyout, and head off to Baton Rouge with a litany of transfer portal recruits heading with them to LSU if they so desire.

My reupped short list per Joe C would then be Lane Kiffin, Mark Stoops, or my boy Michael Leach with his law degree from Pepperdine and the part on his resume where he locked Adam James in an equipment shed and then told his ESPN father to pretty much f–k off. I love that. Leach would only get a two year guaranteed contract from me though.

For Mike Gundy though this is his day in court. Mike Gundy as a player from ’86-’89 was 0-4 vs. OU with Hart Lee Dykes, Thurman Thomas, and Barry Sanders. People forget Hart Lee Dykes was one of the most ballyhooed recruits in college football history. The recruitment of Hart Lee Dykes could in itself be a book as four universities were put on probation recruiting Hart Lee Dykes from Bay City, Texas. O State, OU, Texas A&M, and Illinois all received varying degrees of NCAA penalties for their violations in recruiting Hart Lee.

Gundy as the O State head coach is bascially 1-15 versus OU if you don’t give him a win for the gaame in which Bob Stoops repunted to The Cheetah….Tyreke Hill.

Mike Gundy is on trial tomorrow. Can he beat OU? High courtroom drama with much more suspense than the Kyle Rittenhouse verdicts being read aloud.

Mike Leach gets the last word heading into Super Saturday.

I’m going to be candid as someone who bleeds crimson..it wouldn’t kill me if Mike Gundy and Oklahoma State win this football game. Sure…it would add two additional chapters and a new epilogue to Mullet King: The Boone Pickens-Mike Gundy Saga. But it goes beyond that with me.

It would sting intially, but I’d get over it in a hurry and still be covering Baylor vs. O State next week provided Baylor beats Texas Tech earlier on Saturday.

If OU wins this game though..I have to admit then my competitive soul would then take over and I wouldn’t want OU to lose in Arlington.

There’s a ton of humanity attached to this game which goes beyond just winning a football game.

The main thing is…I respect the manner in which Mike Gundy, his staff, and his players have conducted themselves this season what with all the SEC distractions from OU and Texas leaving.

Unlike from their president the emotional Dr. Schrum…I’ve never heard much bitching and whining. In reality…I think Gundy is glad he won’t have to keep playing OU after next season. Gundy and his players have basically just worked hard to get better every week. To find a style of play which fits with QB Spencer Sanders and attempt to win with toughness every week.

Consider this… minus the 28-23 win over Tulsa and the 24-21 loss at Iowa State–this team has covered the Vegas spread in their nine other wins to get to 10-1. This is not a glamorous offensive football team. This team in my view is nothing like previous Mike Gundy teams out on the wide receiver positions.

It actually stunned me the portal transfer Tay Martin was talking some nonsense earlier this week. If I were Alex Grinch… T-Martin in my view will physically wilt if someone hits him in the mouth in the first period. If I were Grinch I’d have Key Lawrence put Tay on the ground hard the first chance he gets. No penalty though. If could step on him without getting a flag that would be even better.

But minus Martin…this O State group has been deserving of respect. They seem from the outside to be a good group of guys who’ve worked hard for this opportunity.

O State for the first time in the Lincoln Riley Era is actually the Vegas favorite to win the game coming in as a home 3.5 favorite. I have the game virtually at pick ’em. By the same token OU for the first time in the Riley Era minus last year and so far this year doesn’t have a quarterback headed to the Heisman show in New York.

Do I think O State is a great team?

No…I don’t. I think what they are is an older team on the back seven defensively who because of the extra year of Covid eligibility have this rare window to walk through this season. I think those back seven when they get the pass rush from the Colin Oliver kid are tough to deal with unless you have an exceptional, consistent QB on the other side of the ball.

If I’m OU O line coach Bill Bedenbaugh my group understands what Colin Oliver means to the O State pass rush.

O State’s linebackers…Rodriguez and Devon Harper are on my list as well. OU has to be able to block these two guys.

Remember this… O State was one Casey Thompson pick six away from being down 24-3 to the Texas Longhorns. Cornerback Jason Taylor’s pick six in my view was the play which literally changed/saved the O State season and sent Texas on its death spiral.

So tell me who’s the exceptional quarterback O State has beaten this season to get to 10-1?

The answer from my view is they haven’t played a game to date versus a quarterback who in previous Big 12 years would even rank in the top four of the Big 12 unless you view Brock Purdy from Iowa State as that type of player. And to be blunt…Purdy was the quarterback who beat O State in Ames 24-21.

So in the four games since then…O State beat Kansas the week after the Jayhawks almost beat OU, pummeled TCU who had already fired Gary Patterson as their coach, beat West Virginia which has the weakest QB play in the conference, and last week shutout Texas Tech who had fired their coach as well.

So while I say I respect O State’s season, it’s not like if I’m Lincoln Riley I’m thinking to myself I’m going to lose this game unless my team plays sloppy football from a standpoint of turnovers, stupid penalties, and a couple of blown defensive assignments.

If I’m Lincoln Riley and I’ve been seeing Gabe Brkic kicking the ball straight in practice this week I like my chances in Bedlam.

If I’m Riley I’m giving Caleb Williams the Jalen Hurts playbook from Bedlam two years ago in Stillwater when the Sooners won the run game and easily won the game. I want 18-20 running game touches from Caleb coming from RPOs, bootlegs, naked bootlegs, QB draws, intentional QB flushes from the pocket, etc. What I’m saying is I want as a coach to give Caleb as much space and time possible as a ball carrier in this game. For this game I want Caleb Williams to get the Jalen Hurts level touches.

I don’t think this will be easy though for either team. Spencer Sanders and Jaylen Warren are playing with confidence. This should be a tough, physical game won in the trenches.

Plus, for OU… Gabe Bkric can’t have the shanks in this game. Hopefully, his buddies took him on a tequila reckoning of sorts and they got his kicks straightened out.

I’m going OU 26 – O State 24.

Have a sensational Bedlam.

BOOMER!