Mike Gundy Handled the QB1 Situation Quite Well This Time Around

For all the hooting and hollering we did in the preseason — OK, I did in the preseason — about how Mike Gundy was not thinking logically or rationally about the QB1 situation in Stillwater, it turns out he actually (slow) played everything perfectly and in the process landed what looks to be an elite signal-caller for the next four years.

When we talk about Gundy in this arena, we’re talking about someone who has a long history of questionable QB decisions and thinking. Maybe he’s learned from those, maybe he just got lucky this season, but regardless he made the right choice at a critical juncture for OSU football.

Here’s a recap of all the levers he pulled at the proper time.

1. The Competition: It would have been easy (or at least not difficult) to just name No. 3 the starter at any point in the last eight months. But it also may have not been a popular choice in the locker room. I talked to somebody who believed Brown had won the team over — not in a fractious way but in a “he gives a crap and his teammates truly like him” way. If Gundy just rolls Sanders out there without any competition whatsoever, maybe he loses a little bit of cachet with his squad.

2. The Decision: I actually believe Gundy when he says it was close until the very end. Was Sanders awesome on Friday? Certainly, but it’s not that difficult to envision a speedy Dru Brown being, what, 80 percent as good as Sanders was (maybe higher, maybe lower). I don’t think Brown has to be a borderline All-American to have pushed Sanders like he apparently did in camp. Or maybe Gundy was just leveraging him publicly to get Sanders where he wanted him. Who knows.

3. The Future: I don’t think Gundy thinks about the future as much as he should, which as the CEO of a program is a bit disconcerting, so maybe he just got lucky that the future won the day in the present. But regardless, playing Dru Brown would have been good for 2019. Playing Spencer Sanders in 2019 is good for 2019, 2020, 2021 and maybe even 2022.

4. The Caveat: The other thing Gundy knows is that Brown is probably going to play meaningful snaps at some point this year. It’s rare for a running QB to play every down of a season, and it hasn’t really happened in his history as the OSU coach. You need your QB2 to be locked in, and maybe Brown wouldn’t have been if Gundy had just gone with Sanders off the top. Which leads us to …

5. The Recap: The answers Gundy had on Friday evening after Sanders assumed the throne were awesome. I thought he handled everything quite well when it comes to what has to be a disappointed Brown.

“I felt bad toward the end that Dru didn’t get in,” said Gundy. “Spencer was playing so good, we couldn’t take him out. (Dru) has done very well. He’s gonna get on the field. At the end (of the Oregon State game), it doesn’t count. His attitude’s been good, and I told him if he doesn’t want to go in at the end of the game, I understand.

“But he wanted in. They’ve done well, and it’s not easy for him to swallow. He’s got pride. He’s a competitive young man. The other guy was playing good. We just couldn’t take him out.”

We can talk if you want about how all of this was conveyed in the media, but I don’t ultimately think Gundy was faking any of it. I think Dru Brown is pretty good but that Spencer Sanders is a bit better right now (with an infinite ceiling) and that Gundy wanted to give them both a chance but in the end couldn’t not play Sanders. This is normally how it goes with elite talent.

I’ve been pretty critical of the way Gundy has explained all of this at times, and I don’t think making the right choice changes any of that. The thing that bugged me was the whole two-QB rabbit hole and saying that the best one would play but that neither one was best. He said it as if they would use the nonconference games to pick a guy but framed it as if it might go on all year. That whole charade was annoying — and the way he was thinking about it was odd — but again Gundy doesn’t owe straightforward answers to me or anyone else.

And in this specific situation I do think he stayed patient, let the whole thing play out and made a good, reasonable call that is both best for his organization in 2019 as well as 2020. He’s gotten pilloried by plenty of us in the past for Cate > Weeden, Chelf-gate in 2013 against Mississippi State and Daxx > Rudolph. He deserved a lot of it. The opposite is true this time around. He deserves a lot of credit for handling a delicate situation with a veteran and a stud rook the way he has.

It’s easy to say this now, I guess, but I never had a problem with the actual QB race. What I had a problem with was the logic of the whole thing — “we’ll play the best guy but there’s not a best guy” and never stating a real path to find the best guy — and the way Gundy was presenting it. It didn’t feel like he wasn’t being truthful but rather that he was talking about it in a way you would talk about it if you didn’t want to talk about what was actually going on. Maybe that’s me reading too much into it (it probably is).

That’s all in the past though. It took a long, meandering road to get there, but Gundy got his guy, and OSU’s offense looks like it’s in mid-October form one week into the season.

Hear me out here: Spencer Sanders is better than I thought he would be, and I’ve been advocating for him for almost a year now. He’s special. What we saw on Friday night was special. That was not normal first college football game stuff. OSU’s offensive ceiling with him, Chuba and Tylan behind a competent offensive line and extracurricular weapons like Stoner, Jelani, Jordan McCray and C.J. Moore has a chance to be the best offense in the country this year. Maybe you could have said that with Brown as the starter, but after a hearty race to that spot, I think it’s probably the best thing for OSU that we’ll never know.