The writing appears to be on the wall for the future of Seth Littrell as the offensive coordinator at the Oklahoma Sooners beyond 2024. Still, regarding a mid-season fire, Sooners' head coach Brent Venables won't commit to making a move like that.
"But most of the time, it’s not. It’s a combination of a lot of things, why you’re struggling. So again, you try to put it all together and have a perspective. Not make any rash decisions based on the information that you have. At the end of the day, there’s nothing easy about any of it. But I’ve been a part of those staffs, too, where decisions were made, you know, at the end of the year, but nothing mid-season."
Venables later stated that the teams he has been involved with have made that change at the end of the season, but there have been none as far as an in-season move.
I get it from Venables' perspective. It's frustrating to see players not carry over their execution from practice to game week.
Oklahoma, efficiency-wise, didn't have a bad game. There were plenty of positive things on film to take away from that game, even if it doesn't feel like it "vibes-wise" (this is why you hire smart film people).
The Sooners' offense actually had more successful plays than Texas did in that game. The difference, ultimately, came down to turnovers and poor execution. In the second quarter, the Sooners fumbled the ball twice, missed a field goal, had multiple penalties, and couldn't sustain on offense. All of a sudden the score goes from 7-3 to 21-3.
In the third quarter, Oklahoma converts a third down to get to their 43. A holding penalty later and they're back in 1st and 20 that quickly becomes a 3rd and 20.
None of this is to excuse Seth Littrell or Joe Jon Finley. As co-offensive coordinators, their job is to make things easier, build cohesive game plans, and call games in ways that put the offense in positions to win. They haven't, outside of the barebones of a plan against Auburn.
Related: Offensive miscues, poor play calling doom Oklahoma Sooners in Red River against Texas Longhorns
I don't think anyone will excuse how bad the scheme, the play-calling, the play designs, or any of the other duties of this have been. Venables himself said they haven't played the way they wanted to virtually every week this season. He won't publicly throw his coaches under the bus like that.
They can point at player execution (a valid thing, in my opinion) as just breaks that haven't fallen yet. There have been plays that are there but haven't been hit, and that's something that they know they can improve.
"“Were there opportunities there? Were guys wide open? Yeah, several times wide open. s the protection there when they were wide open? Yeah, it sure was. Do we got to pull the trigger? Yeah, we do. And do we got to get better with our route detail? There’s a coaching piece to that, what you put on the field is a reflection of what you are coached. But at the same time, you have to take what we practice, what we did right at practice and we got to take it to game day. We can’t lose our mind. And too often that happens as well."
However, just firing everyone, as much as fans want to (and they'll want to fire the next staff too after one bad game, and the next, and the next), doesn't make sense at this stage. I don't disagree that they have been poor. I think they're gone at the end of this season.
Yet, at this stage of the season where the team is still fighting for a bowl game with plenty still in front of them, creating even more turnover and chaos on a side of the ball with as much turnover as they've already had this season doesn't appeal to anyone.
Could that change this weekend? With a poor performance against South Carolina, win or loss, and games against Ole Miss, Alabama, Missouri, and LSU looming large, Venables's stance might change. However, he hasn't committed to it yet.
The two most-telling parts of Venables's press conference regarding the offense were the words he used to describe the offense and how remarkably open he was to the specific question regarding firing Littrell (and perhaps others).
Venables repeatedly called the offense "alarming", "disappointing", "frustrating", "discouraging" and other synonyms of the same word: Poor. This isn't a coach saying "we're close" or the usual other coachspeak about it, Venables definitely recognizes that the offense has issues .
The part that reinforces this, in my mind, is the fact that Venables didn't get defensive about the question. He was asked, point blank, if he had thought about mid-season fires for poor performances, and Venables went along with it . Venables is a passionate guy who isn't afraid to speak his mind and defend players and other coaches and has done so. Today, he just answered the question, leading to the above answer.
It's clear though that something has to change on the offense from the first six games of the season. It's unacceptable and unsustainable.
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