Trotwood-Madison vs. Winton Woods
.jpg)
2009-10 UD men's basketball
Pyramid Hill lights up
Award-winning columnist Tom Archdeacon — an old-school storyteller in a brand-new venue — writes about sports, the city, southwest Ohio and anything else that catches his fancy… or yours.Home > Blogs > Through the Arch > Archives > 2007 > December > 07 > Entry
Voting for Some Heisman History
Come Saturday night in New York City, I believe history will be made. And I’ll be glad to have had a little hand in it.
Florida quarterback Tim Tebow almost certainly will become the first sophomore to win the Heisman Trophy. I voted for him and while that might not sound like much, but it is the first time I — like a lot of the other voters, I’m sure — ever put a second-year college player on the top of my ballot.
For the most part, those of us who vote — media members and former Heisman winners — always have favored the older candidates.
Even though the rules say the award should go to the most outstanding player in the country for that particular season, we figured the younger guys would have another chance at it. Too often we’ve tended to view the selection as something of career award.
I nearly went that way this year and made Hawaii’s quarterback Colt Brennan my top pick. And I think that would have been a legitimate choice.
Brennan’s thrown for 4,174 yards and 38 touchdowns this year — has an NCAA Division 1A record 131 TD tosses for his career — and has led the 12-0 Warriors to the only perfect record in D-1 football and his school’s first-ever BCS bid.
I don’t know if any one player meant more to his team than Brennan did to his. Still I ended up voting him second, in part, because Hawaii’s schedule — especially with the non-conference games factored in — was mediocre at best.
Arkansas running back Darren McFadden may well be the most gifted player in college football. But he played rather ordinarily in three of the Razorbacks’ October games and that made him my third pick.
Tebow, though, had a Heisman year.
He’s the first quarterback ever to reach the 20-20 club in one season. He threw for 29 touchdowns and 3,128 yards, while rushing for 22 touchdowns and a team-high 838 yards. He’s thrown only six interceptions in 317 pass attempts and he’s done most of this in the Southeastern Conference, the best football league in the land this year.
Three years ago in a situation similar to this year’s, I bypassed the dominating younger player— Oklahoma freshman running back, Adrian Peterson — and voted Southern Cal quarterback Matt Leinhart No. 1. He won.
Over the years, a lot of other voters have done it that way, too. There’s been a bias against sophomore or freshman candidates going back to the initial Heisman vote in 1944 when Ohio State senior quarterback, Les Horvath, won the vote over Army’s — more deserving many figured — two sophomore running backs, Glenn Davis and Doc Blanchard.
And in the two years that followed — after “waiting their turns” — Blanchard and Davis each did win his Heisman.
Since then, younger players — from Georgia freshman Herschel Walker to San Diego’s sophomore back Marshall Faulk — always were handed supporting roles when a top older player was on the stage.
As for Tebow, he could end up making more history before his college days are done.
A history known only to Archie Griffin.
Comments
By Jim in Getrealville Ohio
December 10, 2007 4:54 PM | Link to this
In sunday’s paper, the comment was made by one of you sports eds that if Tebow played for Hawaii, he’d probably have thrown for 4 more touchdowns a game. Not being a Florida fan by any stretch-(go BUCKS!!), it’s kinda hard to say this, but, if Colt Brennon would’ve played for Florida, the Gators would’ve NOT lost those T-H-R-E-E games and the guy who should’ve won the Heisman, would’ve!!!!