Mike Gundy explains why he does not tell players to ignore social media

Mike Gundy knows trying to stop his players from reading the discourse about Oklahoma State on social media is a fool’s errand. The Cowboys leader has decided to not even try to tell his team to ignore the noise.

Oklahoma State is 1-1 at the moment, but they’re coming off a massive 66-point blowout loss at Oregon. With a couple home games on the schedule coming up next, Gundy elaborated on his social media strategy with his players during a press conference this week.

“I don’t even try to tell them not to look or read it, because I think I’d just be wasting my time. It’s like when coaches used to take phones away in meetings — that used to be a big deal four or five years ago. Now, the coaches are worse than the players,” Gundy told the media.

“So we don’t pretend to say, ‘Don’t do this, don’t do that.’ I can’t even get my own three boys to not read it, so how am I going to get that accomplished with the team? If you can get that done, I’ll pay you a really good salary.

“Here’s what I do: social media is going on, phones are going on, and it’s okay. You just have to pick and choose, and then be able to put certain things aside and go back to work. That’s how we handle it.

“That doesn’t mean it’s right. … I think it’s extremely difficult. It’s a real challenge. A lot of people get into this stuff and don’t let it go — and it drives them crazy.”

As you can tell, Gundy was extremely candid, and his response certainly makes sense. In this day and age, it’s borderline impossible to ignore social media, so it’s better to help players cope with it instead of eliminating the idea.

At the moment, there’s bigger fish to fry for Gundy. He’s trying to keep his job amid a rash of firings in college football, as UCLA’s DeShaun Foster and Virginia Tech’s Brent Pry were fired over the weekend.

ESPN’s Pete Thamel has Oklahoma State’s Mike Gundy up next on the potential chopping block: “I think the next person in the crosshairs is Mike Gundy at Oklahoma State,” said Thamel, via the College GameDay Podcast.

“They are not very good, and I think we’ve been pretty blunt about that on this podcast. And, I think it was Stanford Steve and I at one point on College Football Live. We were kind of talking about, like, naming that score. 10 new coaches, whole new roster – it’s just sort of sputtering to an end at Oklahoma State.”

It remains to be seen if Gundy can get the job done, but the loss to the Ducks hasn’t inspired much confidence, both on social media and in real life. Perhaps the Cowboys leader can pull it off, but it doesn’t seem likely for Oklahoma State in 2025.