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Former Oklahoma Offensive Lineman Signs With SMU

Joshua Bates came to the Sooners as a 4-star center and spent the early part of this season in the starting lineup due to various injuries and shuffling up front.

John E. Hoover

Oklahoma center Joshua Bates
Oklahoma center Joshua Bates / John E. Hoover / Sooners On SI
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A former Oklahoma offensive lineman has found a new home.

And it feels almost like a trade.

At the end of spring practice in April, Joshua Bates was hoping to be the Sooners’ starting center, but that fell by the wayside when OU landed SMU starter Branson Hickman shortly after spring ball ended.

Now Bates has signed with SMU, according to On3’s Pete Nakos.

Bates played in just one game as a true freshman in 2023, participating in OU’s season-opening win against Arkansas State. 

But in 2024, he was a key player in the OU offensive line — at least early on.

Bates played in four games and started twice at center.

It didn’t go well, as Bates had an emotional meltdown in Week 2 against Houston and played only two more games after that.

Bates was the Sooners’ first commitment of the 2023 class, pledging to OU back in August 2021, during his junior season at Durango High School in Colorado. He was the only member of the 2023 class of newcomers who actually committed when Lincoln Riley was still the head coach.

“So I waited, and they hired Coach (Brent) Venables — the best defensive coordinator in college football,” Bates told AllSooners in 2023. “And I had a call with him the next day. Right as he got hired, he called me. And after talking to him, I mean, if you’ve ever talked to coach Venables, you’re all-in immediately. That’s kind of how it just is.”

Bates was a participant in the 2023 All-American Bowl, starting center for the West team.

He said then that OU offensive line coach Bill Bedenbaugh kept an open line to him after Riley bolted for USC.

“At one point, he didn’t know if he had a job and I didn’t know if I had a spot as a scholarship at Oklahoma. But he was calling me, he was saying, ‘Josh, don’t go anywhere.’ He said, ’Just stick it out. Wherever I go, you’re gonna have a spot. You’re gonna have a scholarship.’ He called me a couple days after Lincoln Riley left, and a couple weeks after Brent Venables called him, and he kept his job and he called me right after. It was perfect.” 

Bates wasted no time ingratiating himself with the coaches and teammates when he arrived at OU. Players said spring and preseason practices were stopped several times to deal with physical skirmishes, and said Bates was usually in the middle of it.

That fiery attitude cost him against Houston, when he got a late personal foul penalty after the Cougars piled on Jackson Arnold following a kneel-down. It stopped the clock and forced the Sooners to punt, and they hung on to win 16-14.

Bates played 62 snaps that game and logged 78 the following week against Tulane, but hten played just eight snaps against Maine the rest of the season.

Bates was the first OU offensive lineman to enter the transfer portal. Since then, a total of six offensive linemen have left the Sooners since the portal opened on Dec. 9: Bates, Ty Kubicek, Evan McClure, Geirean Hatchett, Kenneth Wermy and Eugene Brooks. 

This year's NCAA Transfer Portal opened is officially open from Dec. 9-28. To be eligible to play right away in 2025, players must enter their name into the transfer portal before Dec. 28. The spring portal window runs from April 16-25, 2025.

Players are also eligible to return to their original school if they fail to find a program that suits their needs.

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John E. Hoover
JOHN E. HOOVER

John is an award-winning journalist whose work spans five decades in Oklahoma, with multiple state, regional and national awards as a sportswriter at various newspapers. During his newspaper career, John covered the Dallas Cowboys, the Kansas City Chiefs, the Oklahoma Sooners, the Oklahoma State Cowboys, the Arkansas Razorbacks and much more. In 2016, John changed careers, migrating into radio and launching a YouTube channel, and has built a successful independent media company, DanCam Media. From there, John has written under the banners of Sporting News, Sports Illustrated, Fan Nation and a handful of local and national magazines while hosting daily sports talk radio shows in Oklahoma City, Tulsa and statewide. John has also spoken on Capitol Hill in Oklahoma City in a successful effort to put more certified athletic trainers in Oklahoma public high schools. Among the dozens of awards he has won, John most cherishes his national "Beat Writer of the Year" from the Associated Press Sports Editors, Oklahoma's "Best Sports Column" from the Society of Professional Journalists, and Two "Excellence in Sports Medicine Reporting" Awards from the National Athletic Trainers Association. John holds a bachelor's degree in Mass Communications from East Central University in Ada, OK. Born and raised in North Pole, Alaska, John played football and wrote for the school paper at Ada High School in Ada, OK. He enjoys books, movies and travel, and lives in Broken Arrow, OK, with his wife and two kids.

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