Baker Mayfield throwing footballs at opposing players? TCU’s Gary Patterson had a good bit to say about that

The Big 12 Championship is this Saturday between Oklahoma and TCU, and Horned Frogs head coach Gary Patterson had a good bit to say about Sooners QB Baker Mayfield during his weekly presser.

Before these two teams’ game earlier this month, Mayfield sarcastically clapped at TCU as they ran out on the field, and he even threw a football that hit one:

The reason TCU had to come out so close to Oklahoma for warmups is where Patterson’s team was told to come out of the locker room. Here’s what he had to say about that and Mayfield on Tuesday, via Frogs O’ War:

We asked the guy that was in charge and he said, ‘I don’t know which way to send you.’

Even as the head coach I had to go through their warmup lines to get down to our end of the field. And I wouldn’t have said anything if coach Riley hadn’t made the remark that our guy wouldn’t have gotten hit with the ball if he hadn’t run through the stretch lines. TCU in 20 years has never run through anyone’s stretch lines. We don’t act that way. You’ve never seen us go out to the middle of the field and yell at each other and do all that. And we’ve had plenty of teams try to get us to do it. That’s not the way we act.

I don’t really appreciate them trying to say that we were in the wrong, because that was okay to let a quarterback throw a ball and hit a guy in the head that hasn’t played for two weeks.

Now we all know that Mayfield isn’t your typical poster-child quarterback after the Kansas crotch-grabbing antics that caused him to miss two plays last week and get publicly reprimanded by the Big 12. But Patterson went on to say that while Mayfield was at Texas Tech, where he played in 2013, the signal caller was known for hitting opposing players in the head with footballs:

Now I’m not saying that was the reason, but I’m just gonna give you a little history. Baker played at Texas Tech, and Lincoln was at Texas Tech, and I have a coach that was at Texas Tech and it was common practice. And there was a Texas Tech pretty well known quarterback that hit a guy from A&M in the head, and they all thought it was funny to throw balls and do those kind of things. And it’s their prerogative, they can do whatever they want to, we’re just not going to here.

But I’m not going to make this game, because it’s a championship game, about all that stuff. But if they want to bring it out into the open and they want to call us out they can do it. They said we were the ones trying to cause all the problems, I beg to differ.

But, we’re going to play Saturday, and hopefully it’ll be two football teams that are playing with high intensity the right way, without talking.

I certainly would hate to see Mayfield accidentally throw a football at one of the TCU players this weekend in Dallas, wouldn’t you?!

Mayfield transferred to Oklahoma after Texas Tech hadn’t offered him a scholarship for the spring semester in 2014. Patterson’s tone toward Mayfield is a bit of a changed one from the past — after Mayfield transferred, Patterson spoke up for Texas Tech, accusing Mayfield’s dad of being a pain:

Just spoke with TCU coach Gary Patterson, who, while at practice for the Horned Frogs’ Alamo Bowl match-up vs Oregon, called over the coach who recruited Mayfield, DC Chad Glasgow. “When did we tell Baker Mayfield he wasn’t getting a scholarship?”

“First week of January,” I heard Glasgow respond.

Patterson: “I like Baker Mayfield. I think he’s a good kid and that’s what disappoints me.

“If Baker Mayfield wants to blame TCU for 128 BCS schools not offering him a scholarship, that’s fine. But ask Kliff Kingsbury why he didn’t offer him a scholarship at Texas Tech. Ask about Baker’s dad [James]. He’s an arrogant guy who thinks he knows everything. If people knew the whole story, they might not have a great opinion of Baker or his father.”

My guess is this won’t be the last we hear about all of this football-throwin’.