Gundy Says He’d be Concerned if His Players Weren’t Discouraged

There was some chatter on Twitter, in our comments sections and in my SMS inbox about how Mike Gundy has definitely lost this team (as if any of us know what that even looks like or where we would go searching for it).

And while I do think the on-field visuals haven’t been great, Gundy said on Saturday afternoon that he still has confidence in his guys bouncing back for the final five games of the regular season (and maybe the season).

“[All the losses] are the same,” said Gundy. “I don’t worry about [players getting overly discouraged]. I look at their effort. Part of that is being a young man and growing up. Part of that is being a mature man as we are as coaches and handling it the right way.

“Do I think they’re discouraged? Yes. Am I glad they’re discouraged? Yes. Because if they weren’t then I would really be concerned, truthfully. You can see that in there. You put your big boy pants on, find out where you have issues, correct them and move on to the next week.”

He’s definitely right about them being discouraged. Justin Phillips said after the game that he was tired of losing, and Jordan Brailford said they had to let everyone on the team know that what’s been going on is “unacceptable.”

I don’t know if this team lacks leadership or talent or both or all of the above, but they clearly need something to get them going. Maybe they’ll find it in the bye week. Maybe the message of unacceptability will land from some of the vets. Or maybe they’ll solve the offense and the defense in the same week.

But Gundy seems to think that, at least for now, his team hasn’t lost interest in what the rest of the season holds. I guess we’ll find out against Texas if that’s also true for the fans.