It's time Brent Venables either fires someone or gets fired from Oklahoma

Oklahoma head coach Brent Venables needs to show a willingness to change, or else he’s the change that needs to be made. 

The Sooners are 4-4 and still haven’t won two games in a row this season after getting embarrassed by South Carolina 42-25 on Saturday at home, right in front of an extremely frustrated Sooner Nation. This was a season with CFP aspirations, but now there’s officially nothing left to play for but pride and a bowl game that no one wants to watch or even participate in. 

Yet, through it all, from a lifeless offense, to loss after loss, Venables hasn’t made a single change to even try to make anything better. Coaches aren’t losing their jobs. Not even players are being replaced to see if there’s a better option when it feels like nothing could be worse. 

Then, during his postgame press conference, Venables refused to answer any questions about changes to the staff or at quarterback.

Brent Venables has lowered OU's standard while being complacent

The biggest scare for OU fans this Halloween is complacency and the fear of becoming “the next Nebraska.” The Sooners’ bold conference move keeps haunting them, as the SEC competition has become an excuse for failure. 

What’s even more embarrassing for the blue-blood program is that there were more boos echoing throughout Gaylord Family - Oklahoma Memorial Stadium than cheers on Saturday. And that’s not the first time this season that this team has been booed by its own fans. 

That’s not an instance where it’s shame on those fans, but shame on Venables for letting it come to this. Fans boo because they are starting to feel like they’re the only ones who actually care about this program and its once-high expectations before Venables took control. They just hope that someone is listening who can actually do something, even if that someone isn’t Venables. 

Venables’ defense was sliced up, but most of the jeers were directed toward Ben Arbuckle’s offense. "Fire Arbuckle" chants even rained down from the student section.

Credit to the young offensive coordinator, he constructed a great game plan last week, but that was clearly an outlier. It also speaks volumes that the performance Arbuckle can be most proud of amounted to only 23 points. Again, standards have been lowered. 

Every game the Sooners have won in the last two seasons was in spite of Arbuckle’s offense, not because of it. On Saturday, the defense had reached the end zone more than the offense until the fourth quarter. The only reason OU accomplished its biggest win of the season, upsetting Texas in the Red River Rivalry, was because of a special teams and defensive touchdown. 

When Arbuckle came to Norman from Washington State, he brought quarterback John Mateer with him. Mateer has been even more disappointing as an inaccurate, turnover-prone quarterback. On Saturday, Mateer completed 60% of his passes for 244 yards and two late TDs. Those stats were padded by Mateer playing against the Gamecocks' second-string when his backups should have instead been getting experience.

It’s as if Mateer has some damning blackmail on his coaches, because during three- and four-turnover performances and missing wide-open receivers, his backups don’t even start warming up on the sidelines. Even when the game was clearly out of hand against South Carolina and LaNorris Sellers was replaced in the blowout, Mateer was still out there, like the Sooners are hiding what’s behind him. 

Maybe the blame for Arbuckle and Mateer’s flaws can be placed on poor offensive line play, but Bill Bedenbaugh is also still getting his $1.2 million salary. Emmett Jones is also still coaching a lackluster receiving core that can’t keep any talent around. 

College football is a results-based business. Coaches, and now even players, are paid a lot based on production. The Sooners are not producing at all. Changes need to be made, especially now that there’s nothing left to play for but hope for the future. If not, fans will keep booing or just stop coming completely. Memorial Stadium doesn't deserve the same fate as Lloyd Noble Center.

Blue bloods like Michigan already benched their former five-star quarterback, Bryce Underwood, even with a $12 million NIL deal. Defending champion Indiana just on Saturday replaced its prized QB transfer to avoid an upset. Oregon also started the season with national title expectations and fired its offensive coordinator last week once it was clear expectations aren’t being met. 

Even if those moves don’t work out, there was at least an attempt to get better. Venables hasn't even tried.

Venables has a quarterback to bench and coaches to fire. If he doesn’t make those changes and continues to utter nonsense about improvement and not panicking, then he’s the change that needs to be made. And if his premature contract extension makes his buyout too much, then athletic director Roger Denny deserves a short stay in Oklahoma. 

Enough is enough. Someone has to have the pride and guts to make the changes that have to be made, or else the only change will be the lowering of OU’s standard. 

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