Kansas Football: Where does Kansas even fall in the Big 12 anymore?

Kansas football isn’t contributing nearly enough to the Big 12 compared to some of its counterparts. The real question is, where do the Jayhawks even stack up nowadays?

For any Jayhawk fan, the football season is a tough ride. We’ve seen 5 different coaches in the driver’s seat over the past 11 years, we haven’t seen a winning season since 2008, and Kansas football has become the traditional punching bag of the Big 12 Conference.

There’s no pride in these words, it’s been a long haul for almost any fan. Kansas has struggled to find an offensive leader at quarterback, and without a doubt, it has plagued this team for over a decade now.

Recruiting in Big 12 isn’t impossible, it’s been nearly perfected in the state of Texas but the issues arise not only for the Jayhawks, but those in the northern part of the Big 12. It’s a common unbalance seen between teams such as Oklahoma and Iowa State, who have an obvious disparity in their rosters. This divide grows much longer when placed adjacent to Kansas.

Kansas recruiting has improved over the last 3 years in direct response to the ousting of former Head Coach, David Beaty. Beaty was responsible for the young product of Pooka Williams Jr., who has had an awesome career at KU. While Beaty brought in a decent number of young prospects, the arrival of present head coach Les Miles has produced a plethora of potential talent for Kansas.

Here we are now, approaching two seasons since Miles’ arrival at Kansas. With the advent of the COVID-19 pandemic, it’s hard to project our current season’s output based upon the previous one. The circumstances that allowed for a 3-9 finish in 2019 are simply not there now.

Among the other members of our conference, Kansas consistently finishes below the mark in a variety of categories. Despite a solid trust in 2019 senior starter Carter Stanley, the Jayhawks haven’t had a great quarterback since Todd Reesing. This places us much below the mark then other schools in the Big 12, who tend to rely on their “above average” quarterbacks as a major part of their program’s backbone.

This simply hasn’t been the case for the Jayhawks. Inconsistent offensive weapons, paired with a defensive history that has unperformed year after year, it’s no question why we appear on the lower half of the Big 12.

Kansas can be a legitimate contender in the Big 12, thinking otherwise is irrelevant. There is plenty invested in the program, and the amount of experience that comes with Les Miles is enough to sell me on it. The problematic debate among fans is when exactly are we going to see it?

A lot of faith has been established in the future of the Les Miles era and that should be taken with a grain of salt. It’s not going to be easy, it will most likely take some time before we see contention for above .500 seasons. What we should be glad to know is that Les Miles is surrounding himself with a coaching staff that he believes is best suited to help us emerge from this losing stint.

Currently, I’d assume the Big 12 conference is trying to appreciate Kansas football as much as possible. To a point at least where Kansas should be equally trying to hold up their end as well, both on and off the field. I wouldn’t sleep on Kansas for too long. While they aren’t as relevant in the Big 12 now, these types of rebuilds tend to come back and give conferences quite a run for their money.