Baker Mayfield the Playmaking Superstar Who Can Lead Oklahoma to Playoffs

WACO, Texas — The rain drops were large and coming fast, as they typically do with the sweeping thunderstorms in Central Texas. The amped up Baylor crowd was screaming at levels previously frowned upon at the devout campus. 

Oklahoma quarterback Baker Mayfield soaked it all in for a split second, covered in black pellets from the McLane Stadium turf. As he hopped up on one ankle after rolling to his right and being dragged down with a horse-collar tackle, clinging to a three-point lead, the walk-on signal-caller looked up first at the sky and then turned around and stared down at the 68 yards that lay ahead.

He had the Bears right where he wanted them.

Mayfield dazzled, spun, threw, ran, escaped, and somehow found the end zone nine plays later for yet another dramatic touchdown drive to essentially seal a 44-34 win against previously undefeated and No. 6 Baylor. The victory firmly planted the Sooners stake in the topsy-turvy Big 12 race and also busted into the College Football Playoff discussion with aplomb.

Sue Ogrocki/Associated Press

Along the way, perhaps as Mayfield was pirouetting out of a dozen tackles on that final score to Dimitri Flowers or on any other of his dozen clutch scrambles, the quarterback nobody wanted out of high school turned himself into a legitimate threat to win the Heisman Trophy.

“There’s something special about him. He has that tenacity, toughness, competitiveness and talent. A bunch of coaches missed the talent,” Sooners coach Bob Stoops said. “He just finds a way, and that gets back to his competitiveness. Call him a gym rat, a baller, or whatever, he’s out there making plays.”

Mayfield finished 24-of-34 with 270 yards through the air, three scores and an interception. He added another 100 yards on the ground, not counting sacks.

But it wasn’t just the totals he racked up, it was how he cut swiftly through a Baylor defense that had several lofty stats, and plenty of future NFL talent but had not yet seen an elite quarterback this season.

The end result was Mayfield getting introduced to the country in a big way on Saturday night. While many will be quick to invoke Johnny Manziel as his best contemporary from the flyover part of the country due to the Sooners star’s penchant for making something out of nothing, the 6'1", 210-pounder should be described as nothing other than a gunslinger.

He makes dicey throws that Brett Favre would be proud of. Mayfield had two fumbles against Baylor, yet recovered both and even had enough shimmy to turn one of them into something. He even drops his arm angle and slings the ball sidearm in a way that is Philip Rivers-esque.

“He’s so tough, so gritty. You can’t measure his heart, the way he scrambles around and makes plays,” center Ty Darlington exclaimed. “That last touchdown to Dimitri (Flowers), nothing is open and he finds a way to make it happen. He took a couple of shots and had blood rolling off him and stayed right back there. We love that.”

Tony Gutierrez/Associated Press

Mayfield’s path to stardom in Norman only adds to the intrigue behind his big night against Baylor. He walked-on at Texas Tech and was named Big 12 Offensive Freshman of the Year. Not long after the print was still drying on that award, he left Lubbock and found his way embroiled in a transfer controversy at Oklahoma.

After a season spent on the scout team and watching the Sooners falter to an 8-5 record, it has been Mayfield that has keyed a resurgent Oklahoma offense that has been among the best in all of college football the past five weeks since suffering a confounding lost to Texas earlier this year.

“That’s in the past, I’m a completely different player right now. I’m a lot more mature,” Mayfield said of the windy road that brought him up I-35 to Norman. “It’s been two years. Obviously it’s always in the back of my mind, where I came from and how hard I’ve worked to get here. But it’s in the past.”

That past is now Oklahoma’s future, and it’s shaping up to be a promising one despite an early season setback that prompted fears of yet another year of missed expectations.

While the Sooners do not quite control their own destiny in terms of, well, anything really, you’d be hard-pressed to not consider them among the best four teams in the sport at the moment.

“You go into the No. 6 team and their backyard and play this way… we’re one of those teams that has a chance at everything,” Stoops said, not quite uttering the words College Football Playoff, but strongly alluding to the postseason as only he can. “We’re going to keep trying to improve. We’ll have an opportunity next week to play as well or better. You come into an undefeated team, ranked that high, waiting on you like they were, a win by 10 has got to be a positive.”

It will certainly be reflected in Tuesday’s updated committee rankings. Thanks to losses by Stanford, Utah and others, a previously unthought-of path to the playoffs has even developed for the Sooners.

That’s just where Baker Mayfield likes things. There may be plenty of open field left, but finding a unique way to conquer every yard seems to be just where the young gunslinger thrives.

Bryan Fischer is a national college football columnist at Bleacher Report. You can follow him on Twitter at @BryanDFischer.