Baker Mayfield Says He Will Always Have a Chip on His Shoulder

Sports Illustrated

Baker Mayfield joined Sports Illustrated from Radio Row ahead of Super Bowl 58. Mayfield admits that no matter how much success he has the chip on his shoulder will always remain as internal motivation.

Transcript

00:00 Mid-season edition, Patrick Mahomes wasn't really doing what he was supposed to do for me this year.

00:05 Then I looked, I was like, Baker is eating. I seen him at the American Century hitting drivers down

00:11 the fairway and Baker is dropping dives. So we have Baker for the rest of the season. Baker Mayfield,

00:16 how we doing baby? Doing good. And you must've caught just maybe the two drives I hit down the

00:21 middle there at American Century. Bro, bro, bro. That was the most nervous I've ever been. I bet.

00:26 So many people around there. I will say the funny thing is, I think, you know, we play in front of

00:30 a hundred thousand, 80,000 every week. You went to Oklahoma, play a whole bunch of people all the time.

00:35 And then they look at us when we play golf and we're like, Hey, we don't want people around.

00:38 And they're like, like you play, my bro, we don't play golf in front of all these people. You're in

00:43 the danger zone right now. Like you can get hit. Yeah. You can get hit. So, Baker, let's talk a little bit about

00:48 your experience. You went down to Tampa and was going to work. Talk to me about that, dog. Pro bowl.

00:55 Had the Lions. Was close in the playoff. Talk to me a little bit about that, man.

01:01 Just from the very jump, they just told me to be myself. And that was like an empowering thing for

01:06 me just to be settled in from the very beginning. And so obviously we were all learning a new system

01:11 with Canalis calling it. And so early on had a little success. Not like we were really that

01:18 knowledgeable about what we were trying to get done, but mid-season low. But the most proud thing

01:22 I can say is the group of guys that we had and everybody that we had, we're sitting at four and

01:26 seven mid-year and everybody just stuck together, said, all right, if we can just fix the things

01:31 that were the self-inflicted wounds, some of the mental errors, things like that, we're going to be

01:35 in a good position to win. And so we stuck together, won five out of the last six, got into the playoffs

01:40 and that's all we needed was a chance to make some noise in the playoffs. And we did just that.

01:45 So when you're at that four and seven position and you're like, we need to make this run,

01:50 are you telling the guys like, Hey, we're going to win these next five to six games. We're going

01:57 to the playoff. How are you telling, are you telling them day by day? It's Wednesday. It's

02:02 basic package. How are we doing it? Are we looking forward or are we day by day?

02:06 One day at a time, one game at a time. But everybody like looking at the schedule,

02:10 like, all right, if we just, if we just do our thing, we're going to be set. But to have that

02:14 mindset of one game at a time, it truly was the mentality that we had. So we were enjoying it

02:19 and saying, all right, just put your heads down. And when we look up, let's see what happens.

02:22 So, okay. You came out to NFC South, you went to the playoffs, you won a game,

02:28 the game that I picked you out to win. We got close to the NFC championship.

02:33 What does it take for you guys to get back in that position? Not calling,

02:38 but now we're going to the NFC championship and we're here in the Superbowl sitting here right now.

02:43 What does it take, Bake? It's eliminating negative plays,

02:48 eliminating some of these, some of the things that can change the game. Cause you always look

02:52 back as you know, there's going to be like four or five plays in a game. You're like, okay,

02:56 this made the difference. And so eliminating those self-inflicted wounds that you just have

03:01 complete control over. And that's, that's what these good teams do when it comes down to the

03:05 playoff stretches, they eliminate the negative plays, they don't beat themselves. And so,

03:09 when it comes down to that, just got to have everybody believing in it, knowing that they

03:13 have a chance to get to the Superbowl and that belief can take you a long way.

03:17 Okay. So I want to know about your belief in the quarterbacks that are playing this week,

03:23 Sunday in the Superbowl. Who do you have Brock Purdy or Patrick Mahomes? And what does that

03:29 person need to do to lead this individual? Obviously Pat's been here a bunch.

03:35 A lot. He knows exactly what to say. He knows how, you know, the pressures of the game,

03:40 how to operate it, how to do all that. And he's, he's tough to beat, but I think, I think Brock's

03:45 got a little chip on his shoulder after getting hurt in the NFC championship game last year and

03:49 not getting a chance to play in it. And I think the extra motivation for him is everybody's talking

03:53 about how he's a game manager. The guy just executes. He does it in his own way. That

03:56 doesn't make him a game manager. That just, that just means he's executing in his own way and

04:00 you got to do it in your own way. So I have tremendous amount of respect for both of them.

04:05 It'll be a good game though. So, okay. You talked a little bit about having a chip on your shoulder

04:10 about, I want to talk about your chip. Yeah. Cause a lot of people have a lot of stuff to

04:16 say about Bate. What do you have to say about those guys that wrote you off? And after you

04:20 did what you did this season, I want to know Bate, talk to me Bate. I just, I mean, I got

04:25 the chips on my shoulder will never, never change. I don't forget a whole lot of things

04:30 what they've said. But it's, you got to turn that into an internal motivation. But for me,

04:36 it was the first time that I was, you know, somebody told me to, Hey, just go be you.

04:42 That's all. That's all we want. Go play your game, go be you. And that's, that's empowering.

04:46 And so I can't thank Tampa enough for that. And so for me, that's, that's I'm grateful and

04:50 thankful. That's what's up. Okay. Talk to us a little bit about your Vans auto parts partnership.

04:55 Yeah. I see it. You look good. Black and yellow. Yeah. We're dressed out today. Obviously

04:59 super bowl Sunday is a big deal, but the following Sunday is national car battery day.

05:04 And so what we're here, we've got a false starts, kill drives campaign going on. Obviously in

05:09 football, false starts set you behind extra yardage situations. You don't like that,

05:12 but in the auto industry, it's, it's about dead car batteries. And so if you have to be in

05:17 somewhere in a hurry, you have a dead car. That's obviously not good. So what we're doing, trying to

05:22 get this campaign going. If you register at aapfalsestarts.com and there's just one false

05:27 start in the super bowl this weekend, you get a chance to win free car batteries for life.

05:31 So honestly, a pretty good gig. All you have to do is register online and hope there's one false

05:35 start. There probably will be a false start. Ladies and gentlemen, Baker Mayfield. We have

05:40 to find ourselves on the golf course this off season. We got to play. Thank you so much, man.

05:44 Appreciate you.

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