Daily Bullets (Nov. 12): Spencer Sanders’ Optimism, and Bedlam Fallout

Good morning, we’re going to try something a little bit different this morning with the Daily Bullets. Thank you as always for making us part of your morning routine, and we invite you to become a contributor if you aren’t already.

Stat of the Day

• Oklahoma State has lost three games under Mike Gundy (54-3) when scoring 45 or more points. All Bedlam affairs. In order: 2012, 2017 and now 2018.

The Bullets

• Guerin Emig on Mike Gundy letting his hair down in Bedlam was good. It echoes what Kyle Boone wrote on Saturday evening in Norman. The call Gundy made to go for two was the right one, and it took a pair to go for a pair.

It isn’t just that Gundy went for 2 in Saturday’s waning moments. Or that both of Tyron Johnson’s fourth-quarter touchdowns in 2017 Bedlam were directly preceded by fourth-down conversions. Gundy isn’t letting that hair of his hang late against Sooners, but rather over the course of all four hours. That’s such a welcome sign for both the coach’s sake and the rivalry’s. [Tulsa World]

• Nathan Ruiz writes that maybe Tylan should be receiving some more Biletnikoff love. Where do I sign up, and how many signatures do you need?

Wallace isn’t a clear-cut winner like James Washington was for OSU last year, but the voters for the award are going to have to take a long look at him as a potential finalist, based on some of these numbers … [NewsOK]

Speaking of numbers, how about this one?

200+ yard individual receiving games allowed since 2000 …

OU: 8
Texas: 3

Tylan Wallace joined both lists in the last three weeks.

— Pistols Firing (@pistolsguys) November 12, 2018

• We’re going to write about how starting Corn this year extended a one-year gap into two at some point. Now’s not the right time because Corn is kinda playing great, but I did find this part of RA’s game report encouraging (if a little off topic).

Then there was one of the best signs for the future that I saw on the sidelines of the Bedlam game as freshman and four-star recruit quarterback Spencer Sanders didn’t show the body language of being frustrated with not playing, but instead showed leadership in cheering the offense on and being one of the first to congratulate players coming off the field. [Go Pokes]

• Bill Haisten is asking the same questions I’m asking.

These are mine: If the Cowboys are capable of a 640-yard response in a pressure situation like Bedlam, how on earth did OSU lose to Kansas State and Baylor? [Tulsa World]

Mark Cooper is asking them, too.

Either way, 8-5 or 7-6 isn’t what Oklahoma State fans are used to anymore. And if it hasn’t happened already, there will be a moment of coming to grips with the fact OSU probably played itself out of a better season in 2018. When the Cowboys play the way they did against OU, Texas and Boise State, they’re a top-25 team. When they play like they did at Kansas State and Baylor, they’re a bottom-three team in the Big 12. [Tulsa World]

The answers — as I pointed out here — might be as simple as better QB play but also might fall at the feet of a coaching staff that, as Gundy has said, gets player feedback every Saturday based on the way the team plays.

• Kyle Cox on the missed Ammendola kicks was great. I had a friend text me on Sunday asking if we were going to write about the olds instead of kill Ammendola. We already did! I noted. I like against-the-grain takes when you have something to back them up with, and Cox does a great job here.

There is no nuance and there’s zero margin for error. You do your job right 95 percent of the time and you’re probably looked at as inconsistent. I don’t know of many other jobs in sports (or otherwise) that carry that weight. If you make one (or two) errors in a day, you are the talk around the water cooler for the next week. In the case of a Bedlam game, you’re a social media punching bag for the next year, or longer. [PFB]

• Two fans of the Big 12 football schedule-making #squad: 1. Mike Boynton and 2. The referees in the OSU-Charlotte basketball game. The former lost to CBSSports.com’s No. 302 team in the country, and the latter may have created a situation for the former to do so. Kyle B. wrote about this here, and so did Nathan Ruiz of the Oklahoman.

Boynton expressed confusion over the foul postgame, saying officials offered him no explanation. “As I sit here right now I can’t imagine that call being made at that time,” Boynton said, per the Associated Press. “But if it was a flagrant, it was a flagrant. It’s a judgment. He went to the monitor and thought it was. It’s an unfortunate thing to happen.” [NewsOK]

Not good.

• Larry Fedora has four wins in two years if you’re wondering if he would ever usurp his old boss in Stillwater. More than anything I think that speaks to how much we undervalue maintaining a program at a respectable level over a decade+ stretch.

• This is a post ostensibly about why blue-chip QBs are succeeding at a higher hit rate, but all I thought when I read it is, OSU would have beaten LSU in the 2011 title game! Also, this is absolutely terrifying.

Welp, now Alabama is running a pretty simple spread offense with a highly talented and versatile QB at the helm and then their normal talent advantages across the OL and skill positions. LSU approached them with an NFL-laden secondary, highly talented front, and cutting edge defensive schemes. They held the Tide to 29 points and that was about the best they could muster up, not near enough for their own offense which managed a goose egg. [SB Nation]

The Non-Sports Bullets

Seth Godin on Tim Ferriss’ pod is all the clicks from me … Tech CEOs are in love with their principal doomsayer (lot to unpack there) … Why doctors hate their computers.

This one is in the queue.