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Bob Stoops Rules Oklahoma, But Mike Gundy Is The People’s Choice

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Bob Stoops might be the best coach of any sport at any university in Oklahoma state (not to be confused with Oklahoma State) history. This is up for debate of course, but his criminal under-appreciation by OU fans is downright laughable. He has won double digit games 13 times (LOL), hasn’t been below eight wins since his first year in Norman and has become the longest-tenured coach in college football while maintaining a ludicrous level of success in a state where he’s almost always the most high-profile coach.

That’s outrageously impressive which makes it hilarious to me when I hear OU fans calling for his head because he only won 10 games and “dammit Switzer would have taken these boys to back-to-back-to-back national championships, Al! That’s four straight, I’m telling ya!”

Stoops has all of my respect for what he’s done in Norman (Joe Mixon decisions aside). The fact that he consistently ranks outside the top three in Big 12 coaches in OKC Dave’s annual survey is humorous if not downright silly. Don’t misunderstand what I’m saying here — Bob Stoops is a dang good football coach and a great rep for one of the most important employers in the state of OK.

However …

Carson Cunningham and I were discussing on a podcast recently. I asked Carson, who covers both coaches, who he would rather his (hypothetical) kid play for.

“Probably Mike Gundy,” he said. “He seems a little more like a player’s coach. Bob is great, and Bob doesn’t show his personality on purpose. Just listen to them talk at press conferences. Gundy is willing to joke around a little bit. Bob is SO serious. I appreciate a person who has a sense of humor and can joke around a little. That would appeal to me as a parent, just someone who doesn’t take himself too seriously.” You can listen to the entire thing at the 19:00 mark.

Carson is not wrong. Stoops lands a joke about once every three years. Gundy has a setlist of topics he’s going to crack on at every presser it seems like. These are not the marks of great coaches, to be sure, but it’s fascinating to me that Gundy has been able to carve out for himself a niche in a state that has always been overwhelmingly pro-Sooners.

Gundy isn’t compelling because of his punch lines alone though.

“We all know that there’s a lot of things that we do that are good, but if we don’t win, I’m not standing up here for 12 years, so it doesn’t make a difference,” said Gundy recently. “We’ve been able to perform on field more quickly than ever in the history of this program consistently.”

Gundy has somehow gone from cocky college QB to hot-headed assistant to goofy, lovable head coach who wins games by the truckload over the course of his 30 years in Stillwater. And the reinvention continues every year. This year it’s an iPhone app and a mullet (like, a real mullet). Can you imagine Bob Stoops growing a mullet?

Part of the reason Gundy is beloved by OSU fans is because he’s won a lot compared to what we’re used to. But his quirks help. Or they do to me. Stoops has nothing to fall back on when he wins nine games because fans think of him as little more than a robot wearing a visor punching decisions into a binary playsheet.

This is the brilliance of Gundy (which in and of itself is a hilarious sentence). He’s become … lovable in a cold, calculated world governed by multi-billion dollar television contracts and run-pass options on third and short. When something goes wrong in Stillwater, “not Gundy’s fault. Nope, fire the OC, but let us keep our guy.” In Norman it often feels like OU fans are looking for reasons to can the head ball coach. Any old reason will do.

Stoops is the father who travels a lot but provides for the family and gives his kids a great (if not distanced) role model to look up to. Gundy on the other hand is the crazy but fun-loving uncle who’s always around that the kids remember more fondly when they’re all grown up. Gundy is the father figure who gets name-dropped in documentaries when his kids become successful and famous. Stoops is the byline that scrolls by quickly.

It’s a strange thing, I admit. Even as I type it, I’m not sure I totally buy it. But it seems as if Mike Gundy has become a more beloved figure in the state than Bob Stoops. Definitely a more memorable one. When the annals are compiled in 100 years, Gundy will be known as “that lunatic who grew a mullet, wore breakaway pants during Bedlam, tucked in his hoodies and won himself a couple of Big 12 titles.” Stoops will be just another in a long list of great ones at OU (even if that title is not deserved).

Bob Stoops is a great football coach and by all accounts a good man. Mike Gundy might be one or the other or neither or both, but Mike Gundy usurps Bob Stoops because he’s a character playing a role in an industry of entertainment, and he’s somehow pulling it off perfectly.

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