Baker's Balls: Wrapping up Week 12 in College Football

Week 12 was mostly a dud in the college football world. There were only a couple of upsets in the top 25 this week (cue Oklahoma State fans screaming into the void), but there was at least some news to talk about. But if you're reading this, there's probably one specific game you care about.

#4 Oklahoma 41, Kansas 3

Looking at the box score, it looks like what you'd expect to happen when the #4 team in the country plays a 1-9 team, but this one got weird from the coin toss.

Sooner Twitter went all "You done messed up now!" towards KU for the handshake snub, but I honestly didn't have a problem with it. I didn't think there was any beef between Baker Mayfield and the Jayhawks before the game, but KU seemed intent on creating beef where it didn't exist before.

The game stayed chippy all afternoon, with Kansas taking some, um, liberties in trying to take down Baker.

That was a blatant late hit by Hasan Defense, and should have been called targeting. Fortunately for Baker and unfortunately for Kansas, that didn't hurt him for long and proceeded to just make him mad.

The game was about as much of a blowout as you'd expect, with OU basically turning Kansas into mush. They would have probably done that anyway without KU being chippy, but it was an interesting strategy all the same.

That first scramble TD from Mayfield to Rodney Anderson was particularly delicious.

Of course, the story of the game wasn't Baker's on-field heroics, it was his feud with KU defenders and fans. At one point, while Kansas fans were heckling him, he turned around and yelled "Y'all have one win! Go cheer on basketball." I mean, he's not wrong.

Of course, the biggest story from the game came in the third quarter, and well... see for yourself.



Yes, it wasn't particularly classy, and I'm sure Lincoln Riley and everyone on OU's staff ripped into him behind the scenes. And to his credit, Baker did apologize for doing that.

pic.twitter.com/1TTIdEqEXj

— Baker Mayfield (@baker_mayfield6) November 19, 2017

Honestly, given the way the game went, I understand why Baker reacted the way he did. I think he could have just as easily made his point by just yelling "SCOREBOARD" at the Jayhawks and their fans. Kansas is a 1-10 team trying to finish out the year, and I get wanting to defend your house, but trying to goon it up is a bad look for a team that doesn't even have the talent to hang with Baylor, let alone a team that's on pace to make the College Football Playoff. As the old saying goes, "play stupid games, win stupid prizes."

There are way too many pearl-clutchers about Mayfield's gestures. Watching ESPN, you'd think Greg McElroy and Dave Patsch were about to need a fainting couch. Of course, local and national media have been shaming Mayfield ever since it happened. There's worse stuff that happens on a football field in every game. I'm not justifying it either, it wasn't classy or necessary from a guy who's that good a player, but let's not make the Jayhawks out to be paragons on sportsmanship either. And being honest, every state in Big XII Country (Oklahoma, Texas, Kansas, Iowa and West Virginia) voted for a guy in November who was caught on tape bragging about sexual assault, so I don't really buy all the moralizing coming from this neck of the woods about Mayfield.

The fact of the matter is, Baker Mayfield is the best player in college football, and unless he gags against West Virginia or (probably) TCU in the Big XII Championship, he will win the Heisman Trophy. And to anyone that wants to whine about character costing Mayfield the Heisman, I have three counterpoints: Cam Newton, Johnny Manziel and Jameis Winston. (And I'm a Bucs fan, so I see where Jameis's head is every week.)

Kansas State 45, #13 Oklahoma State 40

While ESPN was having a conniption fit over Mayfield's grab, Bill Snyder continued to be the Purple Wizard of Oz, leading his Wildcats to a 45-40 win in Stillwater and guaranteeing a bowl bid for K-State. It's OSU's third loss of the season, all in The House that Boone Pickens Built, and it takes them out of contention for the Big XII Championship. Mason Rudolph should have been an equal to Mayfield the last three years, and he's got talent, but he's never quite had that "it" factor. 

Texas 28, West Virginia 14

WVU's starting QB, Will Grier, left the game with a finger bent the wrong way. He's already been ruled out for next week's regular season finale in Norman, so hope for a speedy recovery for him by their bowl game.

Unfortunately for us Reddit nerds, Texas winning means they get all of West Virginia's land on /r/CFB's imperialism map. Which, unfortunately, means OU can't get their land back this year, and worse, burnt orange will cover the entire state of Oklahoma. Yuck.

#12 TCU 27, Texas Tech 3

TCU's starting QB, Kenny Hill, missed the game from a concussion suffered near the end of the OU game last week. It didn't matter all that much. Gary Patterson can still coach a defense, and another shot at the Sooners awaits in Arlington in two weeks. They just have to get by Baylor first.

Iowa State 23, Baylor 13

A one-win team got rolled at home by a more talented team. Film at eleven. 

Iowa State technically can still make the Big XII Championship if they beat Kansas State (not impossible) and Baylor beats TCU next week (lol). Either way, they've had a season worth being proud of.

Quick Notes

My picks this week were not the best. I had a respectable 4-2 in straight win/loss (thanks again, OSU and WVU), but I had a bad week against the spread, going 2-4. OU won by 38 with a 37 point line, and that's a bad beat if there ever was one. Wisconsin beat Michigan 24-10 when I had Michigan covering. 

The Lightning lost a hard one to the New York Islanders last night, 5-3, on a night where they honored Dave Andreychuk, a veteran from the '04 Stanley Cup-winning Bolts, on his induction into the NHL Hall of Fame. Not a great loss, but the team is still 15-3-2 through their first 20 games, and they still have a good lead on the other teams in their league. After stomping Dallas and our former hero Ben Bishop 6-1 earlier in the week, I think they can chalk up that loss as a fluke, or just a good win by the Islanders.

The Thunder blew a 19-point lead to the San Antonio Spurs on Friday night, because of course they did, losing 104-101 and falling to 7-8 on the year. Losing to the Spurs by three normally isn't a bad loss, but blowing that lead against a Spurs team without Kawhi Leonard... not great. They've got a tough game tomorrow night against New Orleans before the big show on Wednesday night, when Cupcake Supreme (Kevin Durant) and his merry band come back to OKC, and the national media will continue to bemoan how badly the  mean old Thunder treats their former superstar who gave them everything and of course he would leave to Golden State because this is such a terrible organization and city and state... 

Unfortunately, I don't think the Thunder can do much right now except just sit there and take it when the Warriors come to town. This team isn't gelling, and they might get it together sometime this season, but it's not gonna happen by Wednesday. I'll probably watch the game, but I expect it to get really ugly, really fast, and ESPN will basically imitate Mayfield's gesture when they gush about just how awesome Golden State is. *vomits into trash can* 

Finally, the Bucs just started their game in Miami against the Dolphins. Tampa actually kicked a field goal successfully! Yay! They're up 3-0 halfway through the first quarter. A win here will bring them to 4-6 and may start to turn this season around. 

I'll probably be back on Tuesday to talk Warriors-Thunder, CFP rankings and maybe talk some Thanksgiving stuff. If you've got anything else you want to talk about, hit me up in the comments or on Twitter at @lansdallius. Have a good rest of the weekend, my peeps.

-AJ