Believe it or Not: On Mike Gundy and the 2020 Season

As promised, Mondays are for Believe it or Not — a weekly column wherein we reset by sifting through the hottest takes related to OSU’s game and determine whether, well, we should believe those takes or not.

Let’s get to the hot stove items of the week, which center around the program’s overall health and the man in charge.

Mike Gundy deserves the scrutiny

Answer: Believe it

Let there be no ifs, ands or buts about it: Mike Gundy is — and likely will always be — the best coach in the history of OSU football. If this were a Jordan vs. LeBron argument, Gundy has the best of both sides of the argumentative coin: he’s got exceedingly rare career longevity, historically high peaks, and sustained success to boot. The rare trifecta for a coach who, prior to his time as the head man in Stillwater, had zero head coaching experience. Boosting his profile is the fact that he’s essentially a homegrown talent that gives fans an extra feeling of charm — that a man from Midwest City who played at OSU and cut his teeth as an assistant under Les Miles grew to be a star.

But let there be no dispute that all of that can be true while also acknowledging that Mike Gundy’s coaching job this season — and for the last few seasons — have not been his best work. Recruiting has stagnated: OSU has not recruited a top-4 class in the Big 12 since 2017; wins have slowed: OSU is 19-16 since 2017 in league play; and losses in games that should be wins — games in which OSU is ranked and facing unranked opponents — are starting to stack up. Momentum is at an all-time low with this program, and Gundy is, at least in part, to blame.

Should OSU fire Mike Gundy? Don’t get me twisted: Probably not! He’s a coach and CEO, an innovator and a pioneer. (Plus, the hair. You can’t forget the hair.)

You don’t just boot a top-25 coach in college football without the sure thing of knowing you’ve got something better. And especially not in the midst of a pandemic, where money is already hard to come by and would be hard to scrounge up for a buyout. But you can’t ignore that Gundy isn’t at the top of his game right now, hasn’t been for awhile, and faces arguably his toughest task ahead over the next several months of building back up confidence in fans that he is still the right man for the job.

The 2020 season is a disappointment

Answer Believe it

Related to the Gundy topic, but also not all on Gundy, is that this season has been a disappointment on the whole. What started as a Big 12 champ-caliber club has quickly disintegrated into a middle-of-the-pack team that has warts everywhere, as injuries have piled up, the offense has struggled, and the team hasn’t met the moment in big games.

Who’d have thought OSU would be 5-3 in league play and out of the conference title picture in the first week of December? Not I! But with offensive line injuries pushing OSU into a season-long game of musical chairs, quarterback play being average, and an offense performing statistically as one of the worst of the Gundy era, this season’s reality has not met by a wide margin the lofty expectations this team faced prior to the season’s start.