Oklahoma football: Baker Mayfield making OU history in the NFL – Stormin’ in Norman

The 2017 Heisman Trophy winner led the Sooners to two College Football Playoff appearances (in 2015 and 2017). He was one of three Oklahoma quarterbacks to have done so in the seven years of the CFP format.

All three of the most recent Sooner quarterbacks two Heisman Trophy winners and a Heisman runner-up started in the NFL this season. But Mayfield has now done something that his two successors at Oklahoma have not. In fact, no former Oklahoma quarterback has ever started an NFL playoff game.

When Mayfield and the Cleveland Browns take the field Sunday night at Heinz Field in Pittsburgh, the former Sooner will be the first Oklahoma player of any era to finish his college career at Oklahoma and start in a playoff game in the NFL.

It is necessary to make that distinction because NFL Hall of Fame quarterback Troy Aikman actually began his college career at OU, before transferring to UCLA after the 1985 season. Aikman not only played in NFL playoff games, but won 11 of them. He had an 11-4 record in the NFL playoffs, playing 12 seasons with the Dallas Cowboys.

Both Mayfield and Kyler Murray, the No. 1 signal caller for the Arizona Cardinals, were No. 1 overall NFL picks in successive years (2018 and 2019), and Jalen Hurts, who followed Murray in the starting role at Oklahoma, was drafted in the second round by the Philadelphia Eagles in the 2020 NFL Draft.

Murray and Hurts came close to joining Mayfield as part of OU history. Arizona and Philadelphia were both in playoff contention this year until late in the season.

While it has taken Mayfield three seasons to find his way to the NFL playoffs, the absence has been much longer for the Browns franchise. Cleveland is making its first playoff appearance since the 2002 season.

Cleveland, which was the laughing stock of the NFL for a number of seasons before Mayfield was selected with the No. 1 NFL Draft pick, has compiled a record of 24-22 since Mayfield assumed the quarterback duties. In the 46 games before that, the Browns were a dismal 3-42-1.

The Browns finished 11-5 this season with Mayfield at quarterback.

To be clear, there have been other Oklahoma quarterbacks who have started games in the NFL, but none, other than Aikman and now Mayfield, have ever made it to an NFL postseason.

Another former Sooner Heisman Trophy winner and No. 1 overall NFL pick, Sam Bradford, made 83 NFL starts with four different teams over eight seasons (2010 to 2018), but never made it to the NFL playoffs.

Landry Jones started five games for the Pittsburgh Steelers between 2015 and 2017. He was 3-2 in those contests, but not in the playoffs.

Research by sports columnist Berry Tramel of The Oklahoman revealed several other Oklahoma players who started games at quarterback in the NFL, but never saw action in an NFL championship or postseason game.

Hugh McCullough started six games in 1939 for the Pittsburgh Pirates (the team changed its name to the Steelers in 1940) and seven games the following season for the Chicago Cardinals. Neither team made the postseason.

Beryl Clark was a teammate of McCulloughs with the Chicago Cardinals in 1940. He started three games that season. That team was the only one in NFL history that featured two quarterbacks, both of whom played collegiately at Oklahoma.

In seven seasons, from 1942-49, with the Cleveland Rams, Washington Redskins and Green Bay Packers, John Jacobs started 23 games as an NFL quarterback, but not in the postseason.

Mayfield now has another Sooner first in mind: becoming the only former OU quarterback (other than Aikman) to win an NFL playoff game.

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Oklahoma football: Baker Mayfield making OU history in the NFL - Stormin' in Norman