So right now it looks like this is going to be an interesting Heisman race.
Don’t expect a landslide followed by a coronation in New York. All the top candidates have issues right now.
Darren McFadden is playing for a struggling team. John David Booty is having trouble putting up sufficient passing yardage in the USC offense. Tim Tebow is a sophomore. So what’s going to happen?
Three factors are shaping the race at the moment: (1) Arkansas’ losses (2) Booty’s numbers (3) Tebow’s groundswell.
In regards to Mcfadden, the salient issue is how many losses the Heisman voters will tolerate out of Arkansas. How much should McFadden be penalized for the weakness of his team? My hunch is that voters are being forgiving for now out of respect for McFadden’s superior talents, but his support will start to peel away if the Hogs lose a couple more times.
I asked one Heisman voter and he said the following:
“Darren McFadden may end up rushing for 2,000 yards, but if Arkansas loses more than three games he has no shot at winning the Heisman. He may well be the best player in the nation, but so was Larry Fitzgerald in 2003 when Oklahoma’s Jason White won the award.”
The second factor is key since Booty must not only lead USC to an undefeated season, but will also need to put up Heisman-worthy numbers while doing so. So far, he is doing well in the touchdowns (on pace for 36) and completion percentage categories (70 per cent), but he’ll have to gain more yards to attain the ‘wow’ factor needed to win. Last season, Troy Smith threw for the fewest yards by a non-option Heisman-winning quarterback in almost 40 years. However, his reputation (rather than his actual senior-year results) as an exciting scrambler–as well as a superb 30-to-5 touchdown-to-interception ratio–helped allay that deficiency. Booty is on pace to throw for about the same number of yards (2,510) that Smith did, but I don’t think that will be enough to win this year. Barring any other uniquely superlative stats on his part (say, a 75 per cent completion percentage, or less than five interceptions), or an implosion by all the other candidates, he needs to surpass the 3,000-yard passing mark to have a shot.
The last issue is in regards to the recent groundswell in support for Tebow. The sophomore quarterback is, in this writer’s opinion, the best player in the country. He debuted at No. 2 in the HP Straw Poll last week, so the working college football media is also starting to take notice (this week’s poll will show increased support for the Gator signal caller).
But there is the issue of Heismandment No. 2 when it comes to Tebow. Can an underclassman win? History says no. However, no serious sophomore Heisman challenger since Herschel Walker has had the benefit of playing for a team that was gunning for its second-straight national title. In reality, Walker might have been the first sophomore to win had Marcus Allen not set the single-season rushing record by breaking the 2,000 yards rushing barrier.
Tebow has that benefit of playing for a team coming off a national title and he is seen as the prime reason the Gators are in the hunt for another crown. He is also an amazing talent and a college football cult hero whose exploits seem larger than life.
And so, we have the caveat to Heismandment No. 2, which I wrote way back when I came up with the rules back in mid-2004:
Whatever the case, the first underclassman to win it would most likely be a physical phenom who played for a national title contending team in an otherwise weak year for Heisman candidates.
This is not a hedging of the bets here. I still think the odds of Tebow winning the Heisman are remote. For some reason, the Heisman gods always find ways for promising underclass candidates to slip up, or for more prominent upperclass players to step up. This is how it will probably end up–it’s still very early in the race.
But, if Heismandment No. 2 is destined to go the way of the dodo, then Tebow may be the guy to get it done.
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