While most teams spend the offseason focused on playbooks, the Oklahoma Sooners are apparently working on phonetics. Brent Venables made 18 additions to his team. However, while announcing all the players, the team sheet didn’t just have the names of the new joinees. The Sooners went a step further to make life easier for the fans.

The Oklahoma Sooners released a list of the names of their 18 newcomers alongside the pronunciation of each player’s name. The post is either a genuine attempt to have fans pronounce every name correctly. Or the Sooners just want to avoid the names being included in a Jordan & Peele skit. 

The list starts with Washington State transfer Mackenzie Alleyne. If you want to know how to pronounce his name right, it goes like this: al-LEAN. Similarly, Lloyd Avant’s surname is tricky. It’s pronounced as “ah-VAHNT.”

As harmless as it may seem, there is also the possibility that the post was a flawed imitation of the English Premier League. At the start of every new season, the soccer league releases a video featuring new international players whose names are difficult to pronounce. The video features the new players taking turns to pronounce their names.

Regardless of the show, the Sooners still boast a roster that is hoped to stand out both offensively and defensively in the coming season. From the look of things on paper, Coach Brent Venables and General Manager Jim Nagy are in the right direction.

Coach Brent Venables and GM Jim Nagy speak on new additions

After making the playoffs for the first time in six years last season, the Sooners are set to take a step further with their 18 newcomers. As expected, no one is more convinced of these players than the duo of Coach Venables and GM Nagy.

“I’m really excited about what we’ve been able to add,” Venables said in an interview on The Oklahoma Breakdown podcast. “This is a really committed group of guys that we’ve got coming back, without question. We’ve declined in our rushing yard average these last four years. And last year we were just under three and a half yards per carry, just pathetic. And we’ve got to get better. A lot goes into that. You’ve got to have a commitment to it.”

Having placed the Sooners in a better place than they were after his appointment a year ago, GM Nagy is confident in what Oklahoma is set to do this season. The former Senior Bowl executive director was specific about the areas the team fell short and addressed them keenly.

“Went into the offseason with a couple of main objectives: retain the core of that playoff roster and create as much competition in every room,” Nagy said. “The staff’s done a pretty good job of that. “We feel like we have the right people.

Tight end room needed addressing to run the ball better, so we got Hayden Hansen. Him and Rocky Beers with all their experience. Jeff Van Dorselaer has a high ceiling; he played right away in the SEC.”

Now that Oklahoma has brought their new additions under the spotlight, not for sporting reasons, but for a reason as trivial as pronunciation, the Sooners faithful are hoping the roster goes a step ahead of where the team finished their 2025 season.