Mike Gundy Says He'll Coach Forever Because He Doesn't Really Have To Do Anything

Football Scoop — Gundy said eight people with director title report to him, and all have been in Stillwater for a long time. He's never been one to grind for the sake of grinding, and he'll be an empty nester after the youngest of his three sons, Gage, graduates from Stillwater High School next spring. The healthy salary doesn't hurt, either.

"We have a big staff now," he said. "I don't really do anything anymore. Honestly, I don't. Gage, my 17-year-old, he comes in at my desk and he sees me thinking and he says, 'You don't do anything. What do you do? You just sit there.' And I said, 'Well, believe it or not, they pay me to think. And so I'm thinking.'

"I could not have a staff meeting for a week and the thing would flow like normal. It wasn't that way for 10 years."

I'm glad a big-time college football coach finally said the quiet part out loud, because I've thought this forever: they don't really have to do all that much.

Now if you're a first- or second-year head coach trying to build a program, obviously that job is very different than someone who's been established at a school. But once you have your program up and running, being the head coach is the easiest job in the building. The assistant coaches are doing most of the on-field coaching and recruiting, there are dozens of graduate assistants and support staffers to watch film from every conceivable angle and take care of everything else a college football program needs done and then the head guy just has to oversee it all.

Does anyone think Nick Saban is in the room with Alabama's assistants and scouting director breaking down film of nine potential corners they're evaluating for two scholarship offers? Of course not. Those people let him know who's good and then he comes in at the end to seal the deal. His job is to establish a culture and hold people to a standard, which he's obviously done better than anyone in the history of the sport.

Good for Gundy, though. He's gotten to the point that he has it made and can do whatever he wants, so I guess we can expect to see him at Oklahoma State for a long time.