Just when you thought Kansas had hit rock bottom as a football program, the faded crimson and blue backhoe fires up after cranking the key a few times, spews oil as it lumbers its way into position, lowers a bucket bleeding hydraulic fluid into the abyss and digs the hole a little deeper.
The latest example of the in-the-wrong-direction excavation? Kansas will host winless Baylor Saturday afternoon at Memorial Stadium in Lawrence, seemingly the perfect opportunity for the Jayhawks to pick up their second win of the season and first over an FBS opponent in nearly a year. The oddsmakers, Bovada.lv in this case, definitely don’t see it that way.
Kansas first college football team in 16 years to be an underdog by more than a TD vs. a team 0-8 or worse (Baylor favored by 7.5 pts)
— RJ Bell (@RJinVegas) November 2, 2017
Yep, KU is more than a touchdown underdog at home against a team that is 0-8 on the season, something that apparently hasn’t happened in more than a decade and a half. The thinking behind the line, though, makes complete, total and utter sense.
While the Bears are winless, four of their losses have come by a combined 20 points, including eight points to then-No. 3 Oklahoma and two to then-No. 23 West Virginia. The Jayhawks, meanwhile, have lost seven in a row after beating Southeast Missouri State in the opener, with all of those losses coming by 10 or more points. During a three-game stretch in October, they were outscored a combined 153-19 in losses to Texas Tech, Iowa State and TCU.
This will likely be KU’s last chance to win a game this season as they close against Texas in Austin, Oklahoma and Oklahoma State in Stillwater, although the Longhorns did serve as the Jayhawks’ last FBS win in Charlie Strong‘s final season.
With four games left in this season, KU is 3-29 in David Beaty‘s two-plus years. Turner Gill won five games in his two seasons after replacing Mark Mangino in 2010, while Charlie Weis won six games in his three seasons before he was replaced by Beaty in 2015.
In the last three seasons under Mangino, the Jayhawks won 25 games. In the nearly nine seasons since, they’ve won a combined 15.