Mike Gundy quotes from Big 12 media days

Photo Attribution: USATSI

Mike Gundy led off at Big 12 media days on Monday in Dallas and got asked many, many questions about what he thought about being the Big 12 favorite. I was laughing before I even saw Gundy though because the Fox Sports Southwest hosts told me they thought Mike Gundy was “totally capable of handling two QBs effectively” and “not worried at all” about it.

REALLY?!

Sometimes I worry about Gundy being able to remember the route from his farm to Boone Pickens Stadium.

Anyway, here are some of Gundy’s better quotes from the press conference.[1. Eight “talk abouts”!]

But first, this…

THE MODERATOR: I think we’re ready to start with Coach Mike Gundy from Oklahoma State. Coach, welcome. Your thoughts and then we’ll take some questions.

COACH GUNDY: Thank you. We’ve very excited to be here ready to go. We’ve had a good break. The players have worked hard. Coaches have been away, as you guys know.

WHAT, No “back at it”?!

If I can’t believe in Gundy giving me a “back at it” after six months off from a sit-down presser, I don’t know what I can believe in anymore.

On being the favorite:

I do think it means a lot to Oklahoma State that people feel comfortable in saying that we’re good enough to have the opportunity to win a conference championship.

If I would have told 2005 you OSU would be the favorite in the Big 12 one day and it wouldn’t be a joke, how hard would you have LOLd?

On the QBs:

I think that we’ll continue to work like we have. We’ve got two young men that we feel very comfortable with, and they’ve worked, and they’re extremely dedicated to our program. They’re great team players. They’ll get equal reps. Won’t say much until after the first game.

First, equal reps? Is this the first time we’ve heard this from Gundy? I think it might be. Also, it makes me feel like we’re going to get more of the two-QB thing than anybody wants. Also, you will know well before the first game who the starter is. I promise.

On have an offensive system:

We have approximately 35, 45 players or so that have played for our offense each year, each season, and when we’ve lost a coordinator to become a head coach, I felt like it was an advantage to continue to run the offense and keep our terminology. So we would bring in one new coach or two new coaches, and they would learn our system instead of 35 or 40 players trying to learn a new terminology or a new system from the outside. For that reason, we’ve had success. So we don’t see any reason to change.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again but this is one of my favorite things about Gundy. He knew early on that he needed systems to fit his players[1. Because our recruiting pitch was basically this.] and so we had the Donovan Woods/Bobby Reid/Zac Robinson merry-go-round offense but now he can recruit players to his system. The latter is better (for obvious reasons) and good on him for rolling with it.

On the Teneessee/Arkansas thing:

To a certain extent, at times you wish that — or I wish that my name wouldn’t have come up or I wish that it wouldn’t have been as much smoke or fire. At times I’m to blame for that. But I’m very happy, always been very happy in Stillwater. So at times, whether we all like to admit it or not, there’s a business aspect to this profession, probably more so than we would like to think.

“At times I’m to blame for that” — that’s certainly true and I’m glad he admitted it.

On playing an SEC team first:

So it changes our approach as a coaching staff and what we do in preseason practice. I have not always been a big fan of it, but we make adjustments. In life, we don’t always get what we want. So it changes how we approach preseason practice. That really is the easiest answer for your question.

“Oh hi Mr. Holder, didn’t know you were going to be here in Dallas. Um, is this thing on or have we not started yet?”

More on the SEC game:

My concern is whether that affects us in November because we really need to be strong in the last week of October and up through November to make that run. We’ve had a formula at Oklahoma State over the last really five, six, seven years that we feel like gives us the best chance to be strong, be in great shape, and be fresh at the end of the season so our teams can perform at the highest level. We have to alter that some when we play teams early in the season, particularly the first game, that are very capable of having success against your team if you don’t play well.

Yeahhhhhh….

Back with more later on.