Football Articles
The Cynic’s Guide To The 2009 Heisman Race
Posted by Scipio Tex on November 15th, 2009 under Football
Irony.
Full disclosure: I detest the Heisman. Even more than hipsters.
Except when a Longhorn wins. Or uses a Downtown Athletic Club slight as motivation to drop a nuclear warhead on USC in the Rose Bowl and then dance around in confetti. I’ve been working on a soon-to-be-released magnum opus to demonstrate some of the more egregious winners over the years and doing the research has only made me hate Notre Dame and the award more. This year we’re likely to add an undeserving to the list. Not quite Paul Hornung undeserving, but in that neighborhood nonetheless.
What is the Heisman? Is it a lifetime achievement award? Is it an offense only award? Is it a MVP award? Is it for the most statistically productive player in college football? Is it for the most talented player? Is it for the most visible offensive player on the nation’s best team? Does it go to the player writers most wish was their secret boyfriend? Every voter seems to have their own slant and each question yields a different answer. Given that Heisman voters run the gamut from aspiring philosophe Billy Sims to East Coast sportswriters that are avid ballooning enthusiasts, all are decidely susceptible to nonsensical media memes, including the word meme itself.
Let’s look at our 2009 contenders:
First, crucially, Notre Dame stinks too badly for Jimmy Clausen or Golden Tate to be considered. The Notre Dame requirement unmet, we may now examine the rest of the field without Beano Cook invoking Ara Parseghian to shame a voter from the Akron Penny Shopper, belching, and then soiling his adult diaper with O’Douls laced piss.
Lazy voters need good players on undefeated, high-profile teams. Oh, what’s that? Texas, Alabama, Florida will do. The three best teams in college football are all led by their defenses and it’s an amusing commentary on the award itself that we’re scrambling to find an offensive player from those teams to give the award.
Mark Ingram is the most deserving of the three Best Team contenders. He has come up big in every game of consequence that Bama has played, he’s putting up quality numbers (1364 yards from scrimmage, 6.6 yards per carry, 11 TDs) and he’s not being supported by a competent passing game. Is he spectacular? No. He’s sort of Emmitt Smithy, he knows how to run behind a high quality run-blocking OL, and he brings it on every down. That Is Enough For Me. He is a safe if unremarkable choice at this juncture.
Tim Tebow and Colt McCoy have no business being in the Top 3 right now. Before you respond with outrage after soiling the diaper that you share with Beano Cook in the manner of all conformists, hear me out and let me fuck you up with some truth. Both of their teams are clearly led by their defenses, both QBs have turned in miserable performances in key games (don’t make me post Colt’s OU numbers and embarrass us all; and Tebow looks qualitatively bad on half of his snaps), both guys have numbers that are way down historically and unexceptional vis a vis their peers, and neither should benefit from the body of work that they’ve put in unless you’re one of those insufferable Lifetime Achievement Award blowhards. If they were first year starters named Tom Teepee and Foal McGillicuddy, we wouldn’t be discussing them except to admire their fantastic names and solid stewardship.
Are you a Statistics Geek? Are you incapable of context? Do you puzzle how Hawaii’s Colt Brennan could have been so robbed? And why hasn’t a Texas Tech QB won it, you wonder. Kliff Kingsbury BJ Symons Cody Hodges Sonny Cumbie Graham Harrell was unique! Case Keenum may be the man for you. And so is Boise State’s Kellen Moore. Here’s the plan: play in a high-flying passing offense against bad defenses, play minimal defense (or just run it up) so that you aren’t robbed of crucial 4th quarter offensive stats, and let the votes roll in. The same people that vote for Kellen Moore are the same who opine, “13-0 is 13-0! I don’t care who it is you’re playing!” That he is a rag-armed midget operating at schematic advantage who is more Cody Hawkins than Doug Flutie is immaterial I suppose. If you think just anyone can throw for 299 yards and 5 TDs against Idaho, I disagree. There are only about sixty college QBs that can do that. I like Keenum more as he has done it against some decent teams and he’s actually good, but losing to UTEP and UCF – through no real fault of his – is unseemly.
What about Wow Factor? It has been proven that three to five good highlights over the course of a year can get you a Heisman (Charles Woodson and Tim Brown agree) if the media is feeling whorish. I give you CJ Spiller. He’s fast, he’s coated in Crisco, he’s shifty, he…plays for Clemson in a football backwater and he’s done nothing to beat an opponent that matters. Moving on…
Everyone loves a dark horse. Particularly when it’s white. Toby Gerhart! I love QCRs (Quality Caucasian Runners) for the same reason that I loved Reggie Roby as a punter. He’s actually a very good RB and he has elevated Stanford into legitimacy while dropping a smooth 400+ yards and 6 total TDs on Oregon and USC in consecutive weeks. What plays against him? He attends a very prestigious university and most sportswriters on the East Coast are still pissed off that they were rejected at similar places, eventually ending up at a latrine like Syracuse or Rutgers. Toby doesn’t really need a Heisman either. He has the choice of a NFL or MLB baseball career and after that he’ll be hired by a Silicon Valley venture capital firm making 800K a year to serve as a lure for other Stanford grads to take an appointment with them and hear out their idea on selling online carbon offsets to Malawi.
Some contrarians like to put forward Ndamukong Suh. This is all well and good as he’s a spectacular and unique player, but his team is 7-3 in the Big WAC North and an interior DL can’t impact the game on every snap the way a QB or RB can. It’s also worth mentioning that he has fewer TFL, the same number of sacks, and fewer QB hits than Texas DT Lamarr Houston. Let’s not get too cute, people. Or were you pushing Casey Hampton and Patrick Willis for the Heisman back in the day? Riiight.
What of Jordan Shipley? Big numbers, can hurt you in the return game, knows exactly how Colt likes the crusts cut off of his sandwich. However, Colt is his vote splitter. And I’m not sure you can award a guy who didn’t put up numbers against your best defensive opponent. Is that his fault? No. Is that his problem? Yes.
My ballot right now:
1. Mark Ingram
2. Toby Gerhart
3. The underappreciated legacy of Gordy Lockbaum
4. A penumbra of emanations from Gino Torretta
5. Matt Barkley! OMG!
I’m might be interested in your opinion.
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Nate Heupel commented on the blog post Oklahoma Sooners – Recruiting So Far 2 hours, 38 minutes ago
BOC: Neither has visited, yet we hold ’ships open for both.
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Nate Heupel wrote a new blog post: Because We’re Dedicated To Doing Stupid Things – Tiny Gallon Reportedly Took Payout 2 hours, 46 minutes ago
TMZ reports that Tiny Gallon took a $3000 payout from an agent. My God, Capel has no control over this team whatsoever. This is 2007 offseason Texas football levels of embarrassing. You can’t let a half dozen bad apples spoil a bushel of 10 apples…that analogy sucked balls, but you get my
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Sailor Ripley commented on the blog post Previewing Jimmer and the Cougars 3 hours, 58 minutes ago
Great stuff, bear. really looking forward to this game.
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Nickel Rover commented on the blog post Barnes worst team 3 hours, 58 minutes ago
06_UT: you are probably right. I thought about changing the post description to “least favorite Barnes team” because that’s more accurate but I didn’t feel like it.
That said, I’m not sure this team would beat those other two. They would lose Abrams and let him go 7-15 on 3s and the Abrams team played better -
admin commented on the blog post Nike U in Turmoil 4 hours, 3 minutes ago
Aren’t they building some sort of super duper hoops arena? Most expensive ever bilt or something?
Who will the get? Mark Few?
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Sailor Ripley commented on the blog post Nike U in Turmoil 4 hours, 3 minutes ago
Aren’t the building some sort of super duper hoops arena? Most expensive ever bilt or something?
Who will the get? Mark Few?
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srr50 wrote a new blog post: Nike U in Turmoil 4 hours, 19 minutes ago
10 weeks ago, Oregon played in the Rose Bowl as Pac 10 champions. Since their loss to Ohio State, the program has been in some kind of bizzaro parallel universe where every headline concerns a player arrest, a firing, or now a resignation.
Mike Bellotti, the Duck AD and former head coach earlier this week
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Luke commented on the blog post First Round: Clemson Tigers 6 hours, 31 minutes ago
Prescient comment, Doc.
I think we learned today that no team is really a mirror image of Missouri, even if Clemson is about as close as it gets. Unless you have significantly better/more talented athletes, if you try to run with the Tigers, you will lose. This team is so much fun to watch in games
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srr50 commented on the blog post March Madness Open Thread Part Deaux 6 hours, 45 minutes ago
Good to see that Tom Penders still believes in the weave offense. Maryland finally figured out that if you pass quickly, the middle is always open.
37-29 Maryland late in the first half.
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Luke wrote a new blog post: Previewing Jimmer and the Cougars 6 hours, 46 minutes ago
Kansas State is going to be under a lot of pressure tomorrow night in primetime at the Ford Center.
Not only are the Wildcats the favored #2 seed going against #7 seed BYU, but if the Wildcats lose, they may sentence hundreds of boys to nonstop harassment from all the kids who think that “Jimmer” was
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Ibas water bottle wrote a new blog post: Georgia Tech post mortem 6 hours, 58 minutes ago
We came up short.
Credit to Georgia Tech they worked the ball inside where they had the advantage and played great D on the perimeter. Matt Pilgrim is the most athletic big man we’ve had in years around here and he was irrelevant. When we tried to drive they collapsed like Chris Farley on a
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Phenomenal Smith commented on the blog post First Round: Clemson Tigers 7 hours, 33 minutes ago
Doc, the turnovers seemed to do the trick – there were great big chunks of time when Mizzou didn’t even have to get into a half court offense.
Great to see Ramsey have such a good game and pretty stifle Booker. As Euclid said during the game, even when Mizzou doesn’t play well
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dick commented on the blog post Barnes worst team 8 hours, 13 minutes ago
“Also because those other teams gave great effort almost every game. This team’s effort was questionable. Dumb and lazy, not a good combo…..”
This is what made this season so bizarre for me. This has never been a problem for Barnes’ teams. But I actually questioned this team’s heart and desire to play together
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srr50 commented on the blog post March Madness Open Thread Part Deaux 8 hours, 26 minutes ago
Travis Ford spent the 2nd half channeling his inner Rick Barnes — lot’s of standing around on offense while one player tries to generate something off a ball screen — then taking a forced shot.
So the Big 12 goes 5-2 in Round One.
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skymonkeyhorn commented on the blog post Barnes worst team 8 hours, 31 minutes ago
This is the worst coached team ever in Barnes era. Period.
Worst defense over the whole season,
Offense sucked big time and the bench coaching was horrible, ransom’s attitude was better then the coach’s overall this season.
Trips write up pre and post better then the game plan and O schemes.
Hell we could have -
srr50 commented on the blog post March Madness Open Thread Part Deaux 8 hours, 35 minutes ago
advertisers think they will probably get some deals for the additional 32 games that would be added. The feeling is that an ESPN would disount rates somewhat, since they already have a dual revenue stream — advertising dollars and subscription fees.
It’s all about content for ESPN — even mediocre content.
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dick commented on the blog post FLV March Madness First Round Bets 8 hours, 36 minutes ago
a great first round of the tournament from an excitement standpoint, very mediocre from a gambling standpoint.
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srr50 commented on the blog post March Madness Open Thread Part Deaux 8 hours, 52 minutes ago
Ga. Tech — last in the ACC in free throw shooting at 64% — 13 for 13 tonight.
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srr50 commented on the blog post March Madness Open Thread Part Deaux 9 hours, 2 minutes ago
A poll of media buyers from the major agencies overhwhelmingly showed that advertisers believe that the NCAA will expand, and the tournament will join the BCS on ESPN.
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whiskey wrote a new blog post: The week in news- Pariahs, Malcontents and Power Hour 9 hours, 4 minutes ago
In the midst of March Madness, St. Patrick’s Day, house guests, nice weather outside and a host of other distractions I still managed to come across quite a few interesting college football stories this week. Here we go.
Mike Leach and Craig James were apparently in the same room this week and nobody wrestled. Bummer. Leach
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srr50 commented on the blog post March Madness Open Thread Part Deaux 9 hours, 16 minutes ago
Anderson finds out what going to the paint is like when there is a big who knows how to defend the low block.
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srr50 wrote a new blog post: March Madness Open Thread Part Deaux 9 hours, 26 minutes ago
So far on Day Two, no buzzer beaters, but there was the obligatory #12 over #5 with Cornell thumping Temple 78-65, but the Ivy League school was everyone’s “inside” pick for an upset. Still the day hasn’t come close to generating the action that Thursday had.
Today
#5 Texas A&M 69 #12 -
Patrick Bateman commented on the blog post Barnes worst team 9 hours, 51 minutes ago
I wasn’t trying to say they quit. They just didn’t play hard a lot of the time. Lazy = lack of effort. Example, our transition defense was about 75% effort and 25% stupidity. We loafed down court a lot. The kids didn’t like to lose so they would fight back,
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Patrick Bateman commented on the blog post Barnes worst team 11 hours, 24 minutes ago
This the most disappointing team because our talent level is higher than those others.
The DGib/Buckman team was the least talented, barely, after the injury to LaMarcus and Tucker’s suspension.
Last year’s team was the hardest to watch. Just watching AJ Abrams, who I don’t hate as much as most, run around like a
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uthookem commented on the blog post Barnes worst team 11 hours, 30 minutes ago
Agreed on Damo being my favorite Longhorn basketball player, I wish him all the best.
This was definitely the worst, by far.
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Trips Right commented on the blog post Texas Hoops vs. Wake Forest: Post Mortem 12 hours, 43 minutes ago
Don’t have time to address each and every comment now, but I wanted to say thanks to everyone for contributing to the site this season. It’s made it a lot of fun to follow a team that’s tough to watch at times.
Also, I wanted to thank you for the kind words as
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Hiphopopotamus commented on the blog post Big Dance: Day Two 12 hours, 44 minutes ago
And that’s all she wrote…relatively boring day so far. A&M out to a nice early lead.
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Art Vandelay commented on the blog post Texas Hoops vs. Wake Forest: Post Mortem 12 hours, 47 minutes ago
Trips,
Great work all year long. Love the passion. The fact that you kept writing these (even around the birth of a child), is fantastic, shows your commitment, and is a little freaky. :-)
I think you showed great restraint in this post. It would have been easier to “go off” on Barnes.
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ghostofagroundgame commented on the blog post Barnes worst team 12 hours, 48 minutes ago
Second awesomest thing — Magnus gets his woman to go to Hooters with him.
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Hiphopopotamus commented on the blog post Big Dance: Day Two 12 hours, 55 minutes ago
Missouri going to hang on…
Sconsin clinging to a 2 point cushion
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BabyTime said:
November 15th, 2009 at 3:15 am
Why are you posting this late? Why am I checking BC this late? I’m in Spiller’s camp. He is the most talented player in the country this year, and I think that is the criteria to use picking a winner. However, I think Colt wins in a carer acheivement moment.
CrazyJoeDavola said:
November 15th, 2009 at 3:41 am
I’d also go with Ingram, if for no other reason than consistency’s sake. The Bama offense is entirely predicated on pile-driver running, and I doubt Richardson would be putting up similar numbers.
I would still have held out for Keenum before today. But he was actively bad against UCF. If you want to talk comparisons: He had less yardage against the Knights than Colt did, and that was playing the entire game. In fact, at least half of the yardage came on the last two drives when UCF was playing the mother of all prevents. UH lost just as much because of their offense today as their defense.
If there were some way to quantify sentiment, it would be much easier to handicap this year’s race. Is it aggregate of heartbeats skipped during an average 2-minute soft-focus promo? Volume of tears shed over heartbreaking torments of youth? Number of foreskins on the wall?
It is interesting to see how much the Heisman “race” this year mirrors the race in general. Throughout fandom and media and the vast and multiple places where those two groups overlap, there’s a definite sense of ennui about. Where are our choirboy gunslingers? What the fuck is the deal with all this dreadful defense? Come back, USC! You can’t leave if you don’t take Ohio State with you!
I imagine the only post-season award outrage I’ll feel is if – that is, when – Taylor Mays is voted 1st team AA safety over Earl Thomas because OMG TAYLOR MAYS HITS LIKE A TRUCK and teams have decided they just don’t like that Thomas boy and they’re just gonna cross to the other side of the street in order to not have to deal with that hassle, man.
TaylorTRoom said:
November 15th, 2009 at 6:04 am
At the State Fair, they were handing out special edition Sports Illustrateds, focusing on the Heisman. There were some in depth profiles, and short blurbs for each winner. Here is what they have for Sam Bradford, as a “Heisman Moment”: “His wild, heels-over-head somersault near the end zone in the Sooners’ regular season finale against Oklahomah State, one play before a one-yard TD sneak.” In other words, a play where he not only didn’t score, he got flipped. They had to pick that moment because the typical Bradford play was efficient excellence, not improvisational genius. He stood in the pocket, protected, went through his reads and threw a bullet 30 yards downfield in less than 2.5 seconds about..I don’t know…150 times?
You’re probably right about Tebow and McCoy. Tebow is actually regressing as a passer, as his passing yardage has fropped from his sophomore year to his junior and now his senior season. He is Florida’s Cody Johnson, except that he gets more carries (about 17 per game, compared to the 11/game VY got in 2005). Do opponents tell their linebackers not to buy any pump-fakes from Tebow where he doesn’t lower the ball to waist-level before throwing? They should.
RichUT said:
November 15th, 2009 at 6:23 am
Taylor, you forgot to point out that he fumbled on the play. It just so happened to bounce harmlessly out of bounds. Typical bounce for OU and Bradford last year.
Not so much this year.
parlin said:
November 15th, 2009 at 6:51 am
Scipio, your picks square with your well-known belief in the ability of the right RB to fix Texas’s ground game.
Suh is my choice, if only for his Whitman-like ability to live with contradiction.
11/3/09–After a late-night traffic accident:
Suh, a fifth-year senior and one of the team leaders, told police he swerved to avoid hitting a dog or cat crossing the street when his 2003 Land Rover hit the first of three cars on a Lincoln street. Police said Suh had alcohol in his system, but he tested well below the legal limit.
11/10/09–Before the KU game, when asked if the Jayhawks’ losing streak gave NU pause:
“You definitely want to go in there and, for instance, keep kicking the dog. You want to keep kicking it and keep moving forward and run it over and then go to the next one.”
Horncasting said:
November 15th, 2009 at 7:28 am
In years like this when no one (or 2 or 3) playes are seperating from the pack, I have no problem giving it out as a career achievement award. Add a few more games worth of stats (ie the amount of time McCoy has not been playing at the end of blowouts) and Colt’s numbers and the overall offensive numbers look quite a bit better.
j.r.69 said:
November 15th, 2009 at 7:46 am
Way, WAY too much politics involved in Heisman voting. Cheapens what was once a most prestigious award.
The Comish said:
November 15th, 2009 at 8:09 am
just give it to Muschamp
jay berwanger said:
November 15th, 2009 at 8:11 am
LOLLLERSKATES
TaylorTRoom said:
November 15th, 2009 at 8:23 am
I can see what’s going to happen. The Dec. 4 will be billed as “The 2009 Heisman Showdown”- Ingram vs. Tebow and McCoy vs. Suh. A beauty contest will then ensue for college football’s most prestigious award.
ghostofagroundgame said:
November 15th, 2009 at 8:37 am
Ingram is a sophomore and, really, he’s not the best football player in the country. Neither is Colt and neither is Tebow. So who is? I don’t know, maybe Andrew Luck. I will diverge from you and support Suh for the Heisman, because it does have a career accomplishment aspect, but you should also have to play well your final year. Dude is really disruptive. Other than that — nobody really jumps out to me.
Tangent Orange said:
November 15th, 2009 at 9:05 am
The winner of this season’s Heisman Award will go to whomever ESPN ordains so. Scipio I wish I could add something to the discussion, but I cannot get past that.
henley said:
November 15th, 2009 at 9:14 am
# of losses notwithstanding, I think Golden Tate is the best player I’ve seen this year.
And I hate Notre Dame and am thoroughly enjoying Fat Charlie’s spotlight squirm.
Spiller is very good but I instinctively can’t support a candidate who gets pimped on a weekly basis with “total yardage stats”. OMG – Spiller had 162 yards of total offense! 81 rushing, 45 receiving, and 36 yards on punt returns (numbers made up but instructive nonetheless). That’s a nice game but not sockknocking.
Sasha is a Longhorn Dog said:
November 15th, 2009 at 9:18 am
If (when) Colt becomes the all-time winningest QB, that is going to be hard for the writers to ignore. And hey. His numbers may be down, but isn’t he still over a 70% completion rate?
The Heisman is a joke. And since its a joke, then it might as well go to a Longhorn in a year where there’s no clear separation between candidates.
The ou game notwithstanding, I personally think Shipley needs to be mentioned. But, right now I too am impressed with Suh. I love good defenses, and it is about time another defensive player wins this thing.
John P. Lopez said:
November 15th, 2009 at 9:30 am
Are you people daft!?! Jerrod has this one in the bag baby!!!
CloseToJumping said:
November 15th, 2009 at 9:49 am
What a bunch of uppity, whiny contrarians this thread is harboring, starting with Scipio, who might as well have thrown into the original post that he doesn’t own a television and all of his clothes are made of recycled hemp.
So the Heisman is a beauty contest? And it’s commercial? So what?
The reality is, what merits being a Heisman winner changes on a yearly basis, in a similar manner as college football. This year, it is going to be about the best player on the best team in the country. No one else is relevant beyond the 3 players from UF, Bama, and UT. Fine by me.
Mark Ingram fumbled at precisely the worst time he could have fumbled all season against Tennessee. He’s very fortunate Lane Kiffin is an idiot, or he wouldn’t be a realistic part of this discussion. The guy was averaging less than 4 yards per carry last night against MSU before breaking a 70 yarder late in the 4th when the game was already over. He has done nothing to merit jumping McCoy in this race and presenting otherwise is laughable bullshit.
Remove Ingram from that backfield and insert their backup in his stead. What happens? My guess is not much different. Remove McCoy or Tebow from their backfields and the argument doesn’t work out the same way. I realize all 3 teams are living by their defenses, but we’re not going to wake up on Heisman Saturday and watch them magically give the trophy to an entire defense. Or Renaldo McLain, or Carlos Dunlap, or Sergio Kindle.
McCoy had weak stats against OU, but he’s produced in every other game, similarly to Tebow and Ingram. Unlike the other two guys, McCoy has sat out the 4th quarter and much of the 3rd in all but 2-3 games. If Brown gave a shit about the award, McCoy’s numbers are off the charts.
Fantasies about Keenam and Gerhart and such are just that. Keenam played shitty yesterday. I watched the game and a big part of why they lost is because he wasn’t at his usual levels. He’s the beneficiary of playing in a terrible conference on a team with no defense. I like Gerhart, but knifing through a piss poor USC defense and having a big game against Oregon isn’t special enough for the guy to even make the trip to New York.
The award this season will take lifetime performance into account. To give it to a sophomore with decent numbers and no signature plays outside of a fumble against Tennessee will hard to do in the shadows of what both McCoy and Tebow have accomplished. Much like the year Eric Crouch won the thing, McCoy or Tebow will take it home for being on a good team, putting up good numbers and setting records for a career, and no other viable candidates can make a strong enough case to outweigh those factors.
Chizik is likely to stuff 9 in the box against Bama in an effort to stop the running game and not knowing any better way to do it. On top of that, Tebow and Ingram will split votes if Ingram continues to get the talk. I’d vote for McCoy, and without apology. Maybe you guys and Kurt Bohls see it another way, though.
ghostofagroundgame said:
November 15th, 2009 at 9:54 am
CTJ –
That was a tremendously crusty, “you kids get off of my lawn” post. Well done.
parlin said:
November 15th, 2009 at 9:55 am
You made bail, obviously.
Bob in Houston said:
November 15th, 2009 at 9:59 am
I’d have Spiller on my ballot for sure. I’d consider Suh. I’d be willing to be won over by anyone at this point.
dick said:
November 15th, 2009 at 10:12 am
If Floriday wins the SEC title game and us the Big 12 title, I’ll be pullling for Tebow to win the Heisman. I’ll take the motivation over that trophy anyday. It means as much to me as a 1st team all Big 12 team selection, which this year will probably include Brandon Carter, Chris Hall and Jared Norton.
November 15th, 2009 at 10:19 am
I think Colt deserves it. I thought it was between him & Bradford last year. He only missed it likely because he wasn’t spotlighted in the BIg XII CG because of a stupid tiebreaker.
Because there is no CLEAR frontrunner this year. Agreed on that.
The career achievement and the runner up last year should get every benefit of the doubt.
It shouldn’t be a career achievement award EVERY year. But absent the dominant star, that’s when that criteria should be given more weight than normal.
As Colt breaks a new record every week and climbs into a higher all-time pass yards/td/ leader he is CLEARLY the guy who deserves the lifetime achievement award. Right??
Musburger said:
November 15th, 2009 at 11:22 am
I’ll go with Ingram this season. Yesterday, I watched Stanford for the first time this season. Next year’s Heisman winner is Andrew Luck. That guy can play.
Scipio Tex said:
November 15th, 2009 at 11:26 am
CloseToJumping -
That it will be awarded as a football lifetime achievement award does not mean that it SHOULD be.
Stop offering football opinions that suggest you’d be stupid enough for me to goad you into trading you Donte Stallworth in exchange for the greatest TE in the history of the NFL Tony Gonzalez and then use him to win the league. Oh wait, that happened. Thank you for your input, Matt Millen. This shows that you’re incapable of football growth and I may choose to limit all of your future posting capabilities to stadium cheers and naming the defense, as this is firmly in your gridiron wheelhouse.
Against the only legitimate defense that Colt McCoy faced all year he threw down the following statline: 21-39-127-1-1. Those are numbers so absurdly bad I can barely comprehend them. His longest pass was for 14 yards and he actively worked to hand the game to OU throughout. At one point during the broadcast, Cody Hawkins began laughing at him. However those numbers don’t even convey how qualitatively bad he played as he unsuccessfully tried to throw pick 6s on three different occasions only to have them dropped by Keenan Clayton and he fumbled another ball on the OU three yard line. The game was singlehandedly won by our defense and running game and anyone who views it differently is insane from unresolved syphilis. When he did successfully complete a pick 6 in the OU red zone, he was silly enough to ruin it by making the tackle ruining any aesthetic effect.
The rest of our schedule has been an assortment of rubes and mediocrities and he’s struggled with half of them. I don’t care if the OC is the problem. It’s not the job of the Heisman voter to hear our plaintive whine about ultimate culpability for Colt’s decline. If he were on any other team, we’d be laughing out loud at any notion of him as the MVP of the college football season.
Contrasting this with some babble about Ingram fumbling once in one game that Alabama still won while Ingram drops 150+ with regularity on a series of quality defenses is silly.
The Kirk (Kurt) Bohls attempted slam is amusing and your incomprehension between the distinction between the the guy not getting the award who was both MVP and the best player in college football in 2005 and a guy who is relying on memories of 2008 is as stupid as the rest of your diatribe.
Aside from these minor differences in opinion, we share much common ground on this issue.
Of course, I hope Colt wins the Heisman. The award is generally stupid and I’m all for racking up the hardware whenever possible if only for the recruiting and PR benefit.
BEHorn said:
November 15th, 2009 at 11:36 am
If Ron Dayne can win it for his lifetime achievement, I have no problem with Colt winning it for his.
If we’re talking about “most outstanding player this year” — which I will define as consistent impact on winning games — then Ingram seems to be the leader. You could add the grouping of Colt/Suh/Spiller, and maybe Gerhart or Shipley, but for various reasons they haven’t been consistent enough to be the “most oustanding” player this year. But there is one other Longhorn I’d throw into the mix …
…. wait for it …
… Earl Thomas. In terms of making big plays leading to wins, can anyone claim to have had MORE impact on the undefeateds this year?
Woody Bombay said:
November 15th, 2009 at 11:42 am
Oh man, the sanctity of the fantasy football league has been shattered.
Katy, bar the door and batten down the hatches.
CloseToJumping said:
November 15th, 2009 at 11:42 am
Who cares about what SHOULD happen? We should have played for it all last year. McCoy should have won it last year.
I am not confusing this year with 2005. Your original post reads like something Kirk Bohls would offer us as he begs for reasons to not be viewed as a homer.
Ingram’s quality defensive opponents are who? Tennessee? Mississippi State? Ole Miss?
I like LSU’s fine, but even VTech is mediocre this year. Your actively pushing for a guy to win it because he’s going to rush for 1500 yards on a 14 game schedule. Congrats. His backup would do the same.
Shit, let’s vote for Dexter McCluster if we’re picking guys that have lit up Tennessee.
Mysterious Package said:
November 15th, 2009 at 12:11 pm
Bama has NEVER had a heisman winner. That will be the case this year as well. Colt wins in a down year unlike 2005. Agreed above, its crap that Suh wont win, but it is what it is…and if thats the case, give it to Colt.
macanudo said:
November 15th, 2009 at 1:14 pm
I agree that Colt doesn’t have the numbers to support a win this year. But wanna know why I want him to get it? Just to piss off everyone who doesn’t root for Texas.
Diogenes said:
November 15th, 2009 at 1:21 pm
Tell Tim Tebow to get the fuck out of my light.
Scipio Tex said:
November 15th, 2009 at 1:31 pm
I agree that Colt doesn’t have the numbers to support a win this year. But wanna know why I want him to get it? Just to piss off everyone who doesn’t root for Texas.
OK, that works for me.
Woody Bombay said:
November 15th, 2009 at 2:29 pm
I think the “Bama gots no Heismans” thing will work in Ingram’s favor.
Sugarpants said:
November 15th, 2009 at 5:23 pm
I haven’t seen anything out of Ingram that makes me think he’s worthy of the Doak much less the Heisman.
Sugarpants said:
November 15th, 2009 at 5:24 pm
To put Ingram’s year in context, check out Ricky Williams’s numbers from the three game stretch including Rice, Iowa State, and whoever was next. I think those were roughly equivalent to Ingram’s whole season.
TOR said:
November 15th, 2009 at 5:25 pm
I’ve been reliably informed by Domerfan that Clausen is the only QB even worthy of the Heisman this year, followed closely (but not too closely) by Golden ‘Golden Boy’ Tate (feel the racism). Anyone else under consideration is a pretender and should withdraw in acknowledgment of Notre Dame’s greatness. Really. Just check out blue-gray sky, it’s all there.
Also, Tim Tebow is an apostate.
ps. nakaramadamadingdong suh, or cj spiller, if it were actually about best player
Scipio Tex said:
November 15th, 2009 at 5:39 pm
Sugarpants -
If he were competing with Ricky Williams that might be a relevant point.
SpiralOut said:
November 15th, 2009 at 6:42 pm
The Heisman is a joke. Period.
Colt far and way deserved it last year and got screwed because of Blake Gideon and Bob Stoops running up the score on terrible teams.
That being said, I don’t want Colt to win it. While I feel he does deserve an award for his play for this team, the Heisman is only about 1000x worse than the Madden Curse. Almost every guy that wins that stupid award goes on to suck in the NFL. That guy’s team almost always ends up losing in their bowl game, too. Only Leinart has overcome that in the past decade and it took facing the worst BCS team in history to get it done.
Let whomever wins the SEC championship game win the award. And then let the Horns and Colt go mudhole them in the title game. Then Colt can laugh in their face while the confetti falls just like Vince did.
tbone said:
November 15th, 2009 at 8:27 pm
Nothing proves better that the Heisman is joke than the fact that Troy Smith has one and Vince Young doesn’t. That said, I’m with mac.
topo gigio said:
November 15th, 2009 at 9:15 pm
i’m with you on ther Spiral Out. I want Colt and the horns coming into that game with lots of talk about the REAL national championship game being the SEC title game. I also don’t want the burden of the heisman on Colt. He had that earlier in the year and it wasn’t working so well for us.
Bateshorn said:
November 16th, 2009 at 7:47 am
Suh is deserving, but ain’t going to get it in that he doesn’t have the eye popping stats Casey Hampton had or some guady Sack statistic. Ingram is a good, but not superlative running back, again worthy of the discussion, but he hasn’t been dropping 200 yard games with regularity to make the sportscenter crowd properly horny.
Which leaves McCoy and Tebow and the fact that this year will probably be a lifetime achievement award. Which augers well for McCoy, since Tebow already has one. But I think to make the voters feel more at ease, somebody in Belmont is going to have to convince Mack to run up the score on somebody to pad McCoy’s statistics. Otherwise, they may buy Scip’s argument about the OU game and hand it to Ingram as a default. Tebow, even in his elevated holy state, has sucked all year and is going to make it hard for anyone to argue his case.
magnusbleuveigner said:
November 16th, 2009 at 8:38 am
Why the fuck do you live in S.F. if you despise hipsters? That’s like moving to Hawaii because you hate surfers.
Shipley.
Scipio Tex said:
November 16th, 2009 at 9:40 am
magnus –
I live in a hipster-free neighborhood. We set claymore mines around our perimeter like Charlton Heston in The Omega Man.
nordberg said:
November 16th, 2009 at 11:40 am
The Heisman has been a career achievement award for many, many players who didn’t have careers as good as Colt’s. It would be typical if that suddenly changed now, in a year where there aren’t a lot of good options. Tebow already has one and Ingram, while a quality back, isn’t really “Heisman good” (question, who would you rather have on your team, Mark Ingram or Jamaal Charles circa 2007?).
Homesick Alien said:
November 16th, 2009 at 2:03 pm
Ingram will win. He comes the closest to meeting the litany of ambiguous criteria used by the Downtown Athletic Commission through the years.
We’ll forget about him the way we’ve forgotten about so many others through the years.
I’d vote for Suh. To me, he’s the Most Outstanding Player, pure and simple.
But just like way more than half of Division I’s teams begin the year not actually playing for the championship, way more than half of Division I’s players begin the year not actually playing for the Heisman.
Mostly, this would be a good year for the DAC to say, “Vince, truly, humbly, sincerely, we cocked that up a few years back. For real right? Here, take this.”
Art Vandelay said:
November 20th, 2009 at 4:02 pm
I honestly think Colt will win. This is the perfect career achievement year.
He will have more wins than any other QB (that’s enough for a lot of folks), add in the ridiculous completion percentage (another record), the respect of current and former players (including rivals), and some potential sub conscious sympathy votes from the BCS screw job from last season.
Colt wins, and will win by a larger margin than you think. Mark it down.
lost soul said:
December 8th, 2009 at 8:26 pm
How about the fact that Ingram had 30 yards on 16 carries against Auburn? Consistency in all of their big games? Not so much. This award should go to Gerhart, but all of the voters wouldn’t dare vote for a player on a team with 4 losses… Thus the Heisman will not be relevant this year. Who cares.