Mike Mayock has a hard time flipping on the Big 12 football tape.

He’s tired of watching wide receivers run unimpeded down the field. He’s tired of watching defensive backs, which are playing quarters coverage, get beat by five yards. He’s tired of seeing 38-38 halftime scores as was the case with the 2017 version of Bedlam.

Sensing frustration in his voice, the longtime NFL Network draft analyst prefaced the aforementioned by giving a fair warning during the recent NFL Draft media call.

“You’re not going to like this, and Big 12 coaches aren’t going to like me,” he started, before listing off things that irk him during the evaluation process of Big 12 football.

“It’s hard to evaluate those guys. And in turn, when it’s hard to evaluate them, then sometimes they get knocked down further than they should. It’s just — and, again, the last thing I want to say is that a college coach’s job is to win football games. It’s not to develop football players. It’s to win football games. I’m not taking a shot at their style of football. I’m just saying it’s a different evaluation for the NFL people.”

Mayock was giving his opinion, along with what he hears from “a lot of conversations around the league,” in response to a relevant question during the past five-plus years — why is the Big 12 struggling to produce NFL Draft picks?

The Big 12 is lagging in that department with just 104 draft picks since 2013, the first permanent year of Big 12 realignment. The league is well behind the Big Ten (169), Pac 12 (169) and Atlantic Coast Conference (188) and is miles behind the Southeastern Conference (270).

Coming off a league-worst 14 picks in 2017, the Big 12 numbers during the past three years are even more alarming — 65 draft picks compared to at least 107 from the remaining Power Five conferences.

For argument’s sake, the Big 12’s 10 member schools pale in comparison to the 15 teams in the ACC or 14 teams in the SEC and Big Ten, but the averages per school remain in the basement.

Since 2015 — the year in which realignment settled among the major powers — the Big 12 is averaging 6.5 draft picks per school, compared to 11.3 for the SEC, 8.9 for the Pac 12, 8.4 for the Big Ten and 7.6 for the ACC.

“I don’t pay attention to numbers in the conference, I just pay attention to ours and I don’t know if there are any other schools, I think we’ve had 24 consecutive drafts that we’ve had a player chosen,” Kansas State coach Bill Snyder said on Tuesday’s spring conference call.

As for Mayock’s assessment, Oklahoma State coach Mike Gundy partially weighed-in, noting he has received different intel from the league.

“I don’t really get that (sense) from them,” Gundy said. “(Mayock) may have some sources different than what we have. I know that the number of players that will be selected from the league is going to be based on the evaluation of the NFL and those particular teams. The in-depth and style and/or criteria they’re using for that would be hard for me to talk about because I’m not in those rooms.”

Any narratives of a full defensive demise may be a stretch.

Forty-eight percent of the Big 12’s 246 draft picks in the last decade have come on defense. Just two years ago, the Big 12 had three defensive players drafted in the first 38 picks.

At least one neutral party, 247sports director of recruiting Barton Simmons, thinks the low overall numbers are cyclical.

“As Texas gets things back on track, I think you’ll see — obviously the Big 12 with 10 teams is always going to be looking up to the SEC and the ACC and conferences with more teams — but as Texas gets on track, I think you will see those Big 12 numbers respond,” said Simmons of Texas, which has just seven selections in the last four years.

Truth is, the Big 12 may never contend with its peers following the blows it absorbed from realignment.

The Big 12’s two most recent banner years in 2010 and 2011 produced 60 draft picks and 17 first-round selections, largely due to the presence of former members Texas A&M, Missouri, Nebraska and Colorado — they accounted for six of the eight first-rounders in 2011.

The Big 12 has 11 first-round picks since 2013, lowest among Power Five conferences. In the three years prior, the league racked up an impressive 22 first-rounders, including seven top-five picks and 11 inside the top 10.