‘It’s been 48 hours of regret’
NORMAN — Baker Mayfield knows what it’s like to idolize Oklahoma football players.
The Sooners quarterback was, a few years ago, one of the kids around Owen Field watching players such as Quentin Griffin and Antonio Perkins and Jason White star for his favorite team and then going home and emulating what he saw from them on Saturdays.
In the 48 hours or so after Saturday’s 41-3 win at Kansas, Mayfield had reflected plenty on his crotch-grabbing, profanity-laced tirade in the third quarter of that game. He thought plenty about how children in the stadium or watching on television would take it.
“The big thing for me is the legacy I want to leave,” Mayfield said. “I’ve been thinking about the people I let down — the kids that watched that; the parents that had their kids watch that. It’s been tough thinking about. I’ve always been a person that wants to set a good example. I’ve always been a team guy. My actions on Saturday didn’t show that. It’s been 48 hours of regret.”
Monday, Sooners coach Lincoln Riley announced that Mayfield wouldn’t start Saturday’s game against West Virginia (2:45 p.m., ESPN). He also won’t serve as a captain.
Hours before Mayfield spoke, Riley choked up talking about his relationship with Mayfield.
Mayfield choked up twice during his time addressing the media — first when asked about Riley’s emotional reaction earlier in the day and again when asked about his family.
“I put Coach Riley in a terrible spot,” Mayfield said.
“It’s not a decision any coach wants to have to
make, but it was necessary. It was a hard conversation because he wants the best for me.”
Mayfield has started every game for the Sooners since the start of the 2015 season, when he beat out Trevor Knight.
Along the way, he’s become an Oklahoma legend, in large part because of his play on the field — his improvisational, gunslinger style resembling Brett Favre and Johnny Manziel at times — but also because of his brash demeanor both on and off the field.
He wore a T-shirt declaring the Sooners back-to-back Big 12 champions during the 2016 Bedlam game where Oklahoma had to win to give the T-shirt the impact of truth.
Earlier this season, he attempted to plant an OU flag at Ohio Stadium after the Sooners’ 31-16 win over Ohio State. Two days later, Mayfield apologized for those actions.
In the offseason, he was arrested in Fayetteville, Arkansas, for public intoxication. He was not suspended as a result of that, instead performing community service along with other internal punishments.
Mayfield said having his starting role taken away — Riley said he’ll play Saturday but wouldn’t lay out when he’d enter — hurt, but that having his captaincy stripped for his final game on Owen Field was a bigger deal.
“It would be hard if it were a regular game or not,” Mayfield said. “It being my last one here — ever — it means a lot more. It’s gonna be tough. Even without all this, it was gonna be an emotional one and hard to handle.
“This makes it ... it’s gonna be hard.”
Mayfield said he understood the decision, though.
“Something needed to be done,” he said.
Kansas coach David Beaty said Monday he spoke with Riley and apologized for his team’s actions before the game.
Jayhawks captains refused to shake Mayfield’s hand after the pregame coin toss, and Kansas defenders doled out several hard shots at Mayfield, including one that earned a personal foul penalty. Riley has asked the Big 12 office to review the play in relation to potential targeting.
“It was absolutely unacceptable,” Beaty said of the coin toss flap, saying he apologized to Riley on behalf of his team. “That was a situation where we needed to make a better decision there. I believe very strongly in good sportsmanship. It’s absolutely essential to the game of football and our mission, which is developing young men.”
Without Mayfield in the starting lineup, Texas A&M transfer Kyler Murray will make his first career start for the Sooners. Murray started three games for the Aggies as a true freshman in 2015.
“I just know I’m starting the game,” Murray said. “Taking advantage of every second I get. However long that is, I know I got to do my job for the team.”