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Oklahoma football: Sports Illustrated apparently not sold on Sooners

By Chip Rouse

NORMAN, OK - APRIL 24: Head coach Lincoln Riley of the Oklahoma Sooners talks with defensive coordinator Alex Grinch before their spring game at Gaylord Family Oklahoma Memorial Stadium on April 24, 2021 in Norman, Oklahoma. (Photo by Brian Bahr/Getty Images)
NORMAN, OK - APRIL 24: Head coach Lincoln Riley of the Oklahoma Sooners talks with defensive coordinator Alex Grinch before their spring game at Gaylord Family Oklahoma Memorial Stadium on April 24, 2021 in Norman, Oklahoma. (Photo by Brian Bahr/Getty Images) /
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Not every media outlet is sold on the greatness of Oklahoma football for the 2021 season.

Five ways 2021 will be a national championship season for Sooners. light. Related Story

What’s that popular saying? “You can’t please all the people all of the time.” Apparently the high expectations others have for Oklahoma football aren’t shared by the editors and college football staff at Sports Illustrated.

In case you’re not a Sports Illustrated subscriber, the popular, now monthly sport publication has come out with its 2021 football preview issue, this year combining both college football and the NFL.

I’ll spare you any further mystery or anxiety. Oklahoma is ranked No. 5 behind top-ranked Alabama, Ohio State, Georgia and Clemson. That’s actually down one spot from No. 4, which was where the Sooners were projected in SI’s way-too-early 2021 college football rankings back in January.

The top-four teams in the way-too-early 2021 projections were Alabama, Clemson, Georgia and Oklahoma. Ohio State was in the No. 5 spot.

While most of the college football media have grown fonder through the spring and summer months of OU’s 2021 national title chances, the staff at Sports Illustrated ostensibly has taken a contrarian view.

SI’s scouting report on Oklahoma praised quarterback Spencer Rattler and the Sooner offense, saying OU’s Heisman hopeful threw 28 touchdown passes last season, and “he has even better weapons at his disposal this year.”

The big question about the Sooners, according to SI — and, actually, everybody else who closely follows college football — is whether the defense can rise to the level of the offense. SI acknowledges that the OU defense under coordinator Alex Grinch appears to be on the way up, but apparently not to the extent the Sooners could possibly be better than two or three of the teams ahead of them in the rankings.

Who knows, the team at Sports Illustrated could get the last laugh if the Sooners stumble along the way in the 2021 season, but I’m betting — as is all of Sooner Nation — that the last laugh will be reserved for Oklahoma.

Boomer Sooner!

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