Oklahoma Sooners again have it all on the edge after Brent Venables’ faulty damage control. The beleaguered head coach had an embarrassing 2-6 record against the SEC teams in the 2024 season. They also lost an Armed Forces Bowl to the Navy with Venables left with no answers for the mess. Well, you can put all the blame on the SEC’s toughest schedule narrative, but if you know the ballgame, you will know that Oklahoma was supposed to be the representative of the SEC’s top-notch standard and not get victimized by it.

But reality hits hard in no time, so Venables keeps finding out ways and means to dodge the flakes, more specifically the pent-up threats on his job. The latest announcement came as a part of that crack but failed to impress fans.

The Sooners often have heavily struggled under the three years of Venables’ tenure. They have allowed a lot of big plays through the air, which has been a recurring problem in the season. The head coach has been quite under the radar in taking care of the cornerback room as well as he lost Woodie Washington, Kani Walker, Dez Malone and others and didn’t bring their replacement yet. He has gone 16-10 in two years at Oklahoma and looks to flip the script in 2025, but maybe not as a head coach, but in an unofficial DC role

Oklahoma head coach Brent Venables will handle the defensive play-calling roles and responsibilities for the Sooners in 2025, he announced in a shocking statement a few hours back, taking full control of the program’s defense for the first time since he joined the force in late 2021. Oklahoma has been on a desperate search for its next defensive coordinator as former play-caller Zac Alley walked past the program for a better prospect at West Virginia on Dec. 29 after a single season with the Sooners. So, the move kind of brought some relief to the Sooners’ defensive headache, but fans remain mad.

They deem it as a fabricated effort to hide or overshadow the holes in Venables’ coaching, heading into a tough 2025.

Fans get mad at Brent Venables after his recent impulsive move

‘‘His job is on the line, there’s no doubt he can be a DC, it’s yet to be seen that he can be a head coach to a successful program in terms of winning,” a fan wrote on X taking a clear jab at the HC’s new stint. Well, that made sense as Venables has enough success as a DC at Clemson but living up to a head coach’s expectation feels different. Choosing what you do best and ignoring the other necessary aspects can’t be a sound and fair decision to bank on.

Knowles was Venables’ first choice after the height he reached at Oklahoma State and the national championship he bagged at Ohio State with college football’s best defense in 2024. But with Knowles not walking on this path, Venables tried to cover the void both in defense and his head coach flaws with a witty move. ‘‘MAN CAN’T COACH AN OFFENSE TO SAVE HIS LIFE SMH,” fans keep on throwing the smack. They are too smart to subscribe to a backup plan. ”Now Oklahoma only needs a head coach,” another one taunted.

However, some of the fans see a 50-50 in the picture referring to some past instances of this case. ‘‘Not saying this is going to happen BUT typically when you see head coaches do this after multiple years of not calling plays, it means this is their attempt to save their job, and if he fails…see-ya. Has worked before though, Aranda saved his job at Baylor doing this last year,” a user put it out straight.

A few users demand a new head coach for the Sooners as they can no longer depend on Venables on the offense. “OU hired you to be an HC if you want to be a DC go somewhere and be a DC let OU go find a real coach.”

It would be see how this controversial step forward favors or affects the Oklahoma head coach in the long run.