1990. This season’s LSU and Alabama football teams remind me of that year. Twenty-one years ago, the Giants and 49ers were the NFL’s superpowers. Like the LSU and Alabama teams that will meet in the Superdome on January 9, the Giants and 49ers were defensive juggernauts. And like the Tigers and Crimson Tide, New York and San Francisco played a highly anticipated regular season game that many thought was a dud (in both cases, I found the games to be among the best regular season football games I’ve ever seen). Once the LSU-Alabama rematch became official, I started thinking about the 1990 Giants-49ers games. I can’t get them out of my head, so I figured I’d just go ahead and revisit.
By mid-October 1990 it was apparent that the Giants and 49ers were the class of the league. Both teams remained undefeated and football fans looked forward to November 25th, the Monday after Thanksgiving, and the prospect of a pair of 11-0 teams facing off against each other. The two teams had won 3 of the previous 4 Super Bowls—the 49ers were two-time defending champions looking to become the first team to win 3 consecutive Lombardi Trophies.
8 days before they played each other, both teams’ undefeated runs ended against division rivals. The 10-0 Giants were blown out in Philly (this was the game that featured Keith Byars’ block on Pepper Johnson, the greatest block in NFL history); the 49ers lost by double digits to the Rams in Candlestick (I’ve always found it interesting that through his first 2 seasons as head coach, George Seifert’s 49ers were 15-5 at home and 16-0 on the road). It’s easy to say that both teams were looking ahead, but that would be false. The Rams had been the 49ers’ opponent in the previous season’s NFC Championship Game and the Eagles had taken 4 of the previous 5 against New York. Those two rivalries have been vicious for over 50 years; the Giants and 49ers were just flat-out beaten.
Still, the anticipation for 10-1 Giants at 10-1 49ers was high. I was 13 back then and didn’t watch much Monday Night Football because I had a hard time staying up until 1:00 in the morning. I made sure I stayed up for this one, though. I knew it was going to be hard-hitting and low-scoring. Those defenses were the best and most consistent of my childhood—yes, even more so than Chicago’s—and neither team gave up a lot of points. Including the postseason, only twice that season had San Francisco allowed more than 21 points; the Giants only gave up that much once. I was looking forward to one of those games that my dad told me he remembered from his childhood. I hoped it would live up to the hype. Man, what a game. The 49ers won 7-3, and the game ended with the Giants failing to score a touchdown from a goal-to-go situation.
I went to school the next day looking forward to talking about how great the game was. When I got there, all I heard was how boring the game was. I was so disappointed. When I got home from school, I turned on WIP because I needed to hear somebody who had enjoyed the game. Howard Eskin came on the air and said the game proved to him that the Giants and 49ers were the two best teams in the NFL. Caller after caller told him he was an idiot. I turned off the radio.
That disappointment is similar to what I felt in the aftermath of the LSU-Alabama game in November. I thought the game was great, the best regular season college game I’d seen since the 7-3 Auburn-LSU game from 2006. People at work, on Twitter, and in the media expressed the opposite viewpoint. Even though I’m not a college football rematch fan, I started looking forward to the possibility of an LSU-Alabama national championship game.
Back in 1990, I started looking forward to a Giants-49ers rematch in the NFC Championship Game. I didn’t think anyone else in the NFC could beat either team in a playoff game. Then a crazy game occurred on a Saturday afternoon in Jersey. The Bills came in to play the Giants in a game so physical that both teams lost their starting quarterbacks. Buffalo lost Jim Kelly for the rest of the regular season; the Giants lost Phil Simms for the regular season and playoffs.
I didn’t think Jeff Hostetler would be good enough to get the job done, but he was. The Giants won the NFC East and Hostetler only had to throw 17 passes as his team destroyed the Bears in their first playoff game. The 49ers easily disposed of the Redskins in theirs. The rematch was set.
I went on the internet and looked up defensive statistics for the 1990 NFL season. I found that the Giants and 49ers ranked second and third, respectively, in yards allowed that year. They were also the two least scored upon defenses in the league. New York allowed 13.2 points a game while San Francisco gave up 14.9 (how perfect was it that their rematch ended in a 15-13 Giants victory?).
The NFC Championship Game. Man, that game was everything. And everybody. Madden and Summerall. Rice, Montana, and Craig. Parcells and Belichick. Millen, Haley, Turner, and Burt. LT, Pepper, and Reasons. Ronnie Lott versus Mark Bavaro. And Candlestick Park. The only thing missing was Brent Musberger’s patented “You are looking live…”
The winner would play the Bills (these are the first-time Super Bowl participant Bills, not the punch line Bills who played the Cowboys in later years), but nobody cared. It had been seven years since the AFC had won a Super Bowl and, though we didn’t know it at the time, it would be another seven years before that streak was broken. In the Parcells era, the Giants had never allowed more than 21 points in a playoff game. The 49ers had not allowed a touchdown in their previous 3 NFC Championship Game appearances. This game, Giants at 49ers, was going to be a war. It was the real Super Bowl. At least, that’s how I saw it.
Today, more than 20 years removed from the game, I believe it is the most physical, hard-hitting football game I’ve ever seen, more physical, even, than the Bucs-Rams championship game of January 2000 and the Steelers-Ravens championship game of January 2009. There was some vicious hitting going on out there. Both starting quarterbacks were knocked out the game. Hostetler managed to come back in. 23 months went by before Joe Montana played again.
The game also turned out to be the best football game I’ve ever seen. I can watch that game over and over and over again, and I have. I’ve seen it at least a dozen times, and I never get tired of it. The Giants and 49ers of 1990 were two aging teams making what both knew would be their respective cores’ last Super Bowl run. Rumor of Parcells’ (first) retirement were swirling. Bill Belichick was going to get a head coaching job. Lawrence Taylor was about to turn 32. In San Francisco, it was about to be Steve Young’s time. Ronnie Lott was leaving. Both teams were getting old, but they were still the best. And this game was the last time the old rivals were going to go at it. This was their Thrilla in Manilla. This was the Giants and 49ers’ fight for the championship of each other. They took the glory and splendor of the November game and created something so much grander, so much more intense. To those men, that game was everything. That game epitomizes football to me.
When I look at LSU and Alabama, I see the same thing. Take a look at the LSU schedule and the Alabama schedule for 2011. LSU only gave up 10 or more points six times this season, never more than 27. The Crimson Tide game up 10 points five times with a maximum of 21 points allowed. All told, LSU and Alabama have the two best defenses in the country. Alabama ranks first in the nation in each of the following: yards allowed per game, rushing yards allowed per game, passing yards allowed per game, and points allowed per game. LSU ranks second, third, eight, and second, respectively, in those same categories. Between the two defenses, they allow a combined 19.3 points per game. And both teams represent a conference that will win its 6th consecutive national championship. Yeah, I’m really looking forward to January 9th. I want to see these two teams play with more intensity than they did on November 5th. I want to see the Tigers and Tide bring each other to a higher level. I expect they will. Why shouldn’t I?
Maybe it’s just wishful thinking. Sometimes, though, wishes do come true.
Showing posts with label college football. Show all posts
Showing posts with label college football. Show all posts
Tuesday, December 6, 2011
Wednesday, January 12, 2011
No Stripping
Since the end of Monday night’s BCS National Championship game, I have heard nonstop chatter about Cam Newton, Auburn University, and whether or not the Tigers’ championship will be stripped from them one day. This talk annoys me. It is nothing but hot air. It should be nothing more than sports talk radio fodder, but I’ve seen this discussion in the mainstream media as well. ESPN Radio’s Mike Golic and Mike Greenburg spent my entire morning commute to work discussing it yesterday. Fox Sports’ Thayer Evans wrote about it. Others have, too. And it frustrates me. Any discussion of the topic is an irresponsible act. The men and women who cover college football should know better. Apparently, a large number of them do not.
The first thing that must be recognized is that the NCAA cannot strip Auburn of its national championship. The NCAA can’t take away something that does not actually exist. The NCAA neither determines nor declares a national champion at the highest level of college football. The level formerly known as Division I-AA is now called Division I—Football Championship Subdivision because the NCAA determines and recognizes a champion at the end of the season. The highest level of college football, Division I—Football Bowl Subdivision (formerly known as Division I-A) has no official champion. That is why you hear the terms such as mythical national champion, consensus national champion, claimed national championships, disputed national championship, and split national championship.
This is not new. The NCAA has never determined a champion for Division I-A. National champions are determined solely by outside organizations. The NCAA is neither affiliated with nor has any control over any of these organizations. Not a one. There are a million and one polls out there, but the ones that are most widely known and recognized as “true” national championship polls are the Associated Press and the ESPN/USA Today Coaches’. These are the organizations that determine who people consider the national champion. But, as I said before, these polls are not run by the NCAA.
Furthermore, neither of these organizations awards a national championship. Instead, they submit ballots and release a poll following the bowl season. The coaches do agree to vote the winner of the BCS National Championship Game as the #1 team in their final poll. The top ranked team in the final coaches’ poll is awarded the American Football Coaches Association trophy. Again, however, this trophy is not awarded by the NCAA. The NCAA has no dominion over the trophy, no say in who can or cannot receive the trophy. As the AP does not award a championship, there is no championship for anyone, let alone the NCAA, to take away. Shoot, before 1968, the AP did not even wait until bowl season to relase its final poll. The Division I—FBS national championship is mythical. It is a fiction that is given life by people.
I know what you’re thinking. What about the BCS? The Bowl Championship Series is another entity that exists outside of the NCAA. The BCS isn’t even an actual organization. The BCS is merely a coalition of the Rose Bowl, Orange Bowl, Sugar Bowl, and Fiesta Bowl. These four bowls are not NCAA-sanctioned events (actually, no bowls are sanctioned by the NCAA). When it comes to bowls, the NCAA’s involvement is limited to two things: it determines which teams are eligible to play in bowls and it determines which bowls are can host bowl eligible teams. That’s it.
Each of these four bowls that make up the BCS are run by private organizations. The BCS itself is a consortium of private organizations. The NCAA is not one of those organizations. But the BCS and the NCAA have something in common. Despite holding an event named the BCS National Championship Game, the BCS does not award a national championship either. It’s just a game.
Now you see that all the talk about stripping Auburn of its national championship is just talk. Auburn is the consensus national champion, but they have not won a national championship. There is nothing for the NCAA, or anyone else, to strip.
The first thing that must be recognized is that the NCAA cannot strip Auburn of its national championship. The NCAA can’t take away something that does not actually exist. The NCAA neither determines nor declares a national champion at the highest level of college football. The level formerly known as Division I-AA is now called Division I—Football Championship Subdivision because the NCAA determines and recognizes a champion at the end of the season. The highest level of college football, Division I—Football Bowl Subdivision (formerly known as Division I-A) has no official champion. That is why you hear the terms such as mythical national champion, consensus national champion, claimed national championships, disputed national championship, and split national championship.
This is not new. The NCAA has never determined a champion for Division I-A. National champions are determined solely by outside organizations. The NCAA is neither affiliated with nor has any control over any of these organizations. Not a one. There are a million and one polls out there, but the ones that are most widely known and recognized as “true” national championship polls are the Associated Press and the ESPN/USA Today Coaches’. These are the organizations that determine who people consider the national champion. But, as I said before, these polls are not run by the NCAA.
Furthermore, neither of these organizations awards a national championship. Instead, they submit ballots and release a poll following the bowl season. The coaches do agree to vote the winner of the BCS National Championship Game as the #1 team in their final poll. The top ranked team in the final coaches’ poll is awarded the American Football Coaches Association trophy. Again, however, this trophy is not awarded by the NCAA. The NCAA has no dominion over the trophy, no say in who can or cannot receive the trophy. As the AP does not award a championship, there is no championship for anyone, let alone the NCAA, to take away. Shoot, before 1968, the AP did not even wait until bowl season to relase its final poll. The Division I—FBS national championship is mythical. It is a fiction that is given life by people.
I know what you’re thinking. What about the BCS? The Bowl Championship Series is another entity that exists outside of the NCAA. The BCS isn’t even an actual organization. The BCS is merely a coalition of the Rose Bowl, Orange Bowl, Sugar Bowl, and Fiesta Bowl. These four bowls are not NCAA-sanctioned events (actually, no bowls are sanctioned by the NCAA). When it comes to bowls, the NCAA’s involvement is limited to two things: it determines which teams are eligible to play in bowls and it determines which bowls are can host bowl eligible teams. That’s it.
Each of these four bowls that make up the BCS are run by private organizations. The BCS itself is a consortium of private organizations. The NCAA is not one of those organizations. But the BCS and the NCAA have something in common. Despite holding an event named the BCS National Championship Game, the BCS does not award a national championship either. It’s just a game.
Now you see that all the talk about stripping Auburn of its national championship is just talk. Auburn is the consensus national champion, but they have not won a national championship. There is nothing for the NCAA, or anyone else, to strip.
Friday, January 7, 2011
Is Jim Harbaugh the Next Rick Pitino
Jim Harbaugh has apparently agreed to become the next coach of the San Francisco 49ers. I say “apparently” because things can change. But if he does take the 49ers job, do his personality and job progression not remind you of Rick Pitino?
Hear me out. This thought came to me as I failed to fall asleep last night. Pitino’s first head coaching job was at Boston University. Pitino took the Terriers from a losing record to two postseason appearances. He then went to Providence, a non-power school in a power conference, and led the Friars to the Final Four. Coming off that final Four appearance, Pitino left Providence for the New York Knicks, a team that saw him as a franchise savior after fifteen years of no relevance. Harbaugh’s path from conference championships at the University of San Diego to the Orange Bowl with Stanford to attempting to San Francisco would follow the exact same path—except, of course, that Pitino traveled south from New England to New York while Harbaugh traveled north along the Pacific Coast.
I could say that about many pairs of coaches, though. What makes Pitino and Harbaugh so similar to me are their personalities, specifically their charisma and the ways they control the media. Both Pitino and Harbaugh earned their first professional head coaching positions by falling just short of national championships at schools that are only good once a generation. Like Pitino before him, Jim Harbaugh left his small school at the right time.
I do not think the 49ers are currently as bad as the Knicks were when Pitino took over in 1987. The Knicks had a great defensive presence in Patrick Ewing and the new coach used his very first NBA draft pick to select floor leader in Mark Jackson. Harbaugh takes over a 49er team that has some pieces in place. Patrick Willis is a stud, and the rest of the defense is solid. With the seventh pick in the first round, the 49ers can, if they so choose, draft Ryan Mallett or Cam Newton to be their quarterback of the future.
While these aren’t necessarily championship pieces, I think Harbaugh has enough talent in San Francisco to not embarrass himself. I think he will eventually go back to coaching at the collegiate level. Michigan or some other glamour program will introduce Jim Harbaugh as its head coach sometime between 2013 and 2015. And, like Rick Pitino, achieve his greatest success there.
Hear me out. This thought came to me as I failed to fall asleep last night. Pitino’s first head coaching job was at Boston University. Pitino took the Terriers from a losing record to two postseason appearances. He then went to Providence, a non-power school in a power conference, and led the Friars to the Final Four. Coming off that final Four appearance, Pitino left Providence for the New York Knicks, a team that saw him as a franchise savior after fifteen years of no relevance. Harbaugh’s path from conference championships at the University of San Diego to the Orange Bowl with Stanford to attempting to San Francisco would follow the exact same path—except, of course, that Pitino traveled south from New England to New York while Harbaugh traveled north along the Pacific Coast.
I could say that about many pairs of coaches, though. What makes Pitino and Harbaugh so similar to me are their personalities, specifically their charisma and the ways they control the media. Both Pitino and Harbaugh earned their first professional head coaching positions by falling just short of national championships at schools that are only good once a generation. Like Pitino before him, Jim Harbaugh left his small school at the right time.
I do not think the 49ers are currently as bad as the Knicks were when Pitino took over in 1987. The Knicks had a great defensive presence in Patrick Ewing and the new coach used his very first NBA draft pick to select floor leader in Mark Jackson. Harbaugh takes over a 49er team that has some pieces in place. Patrick Willis is a stud, and the rest of the defense is solid. With the seventh pick in the first round, the 49ers can, if they so choose, draft Ryan Mallett or Cam Newton to be their quarterback of the future.
While these aren’t necessarily championship pieces, I think Harbaugh has enough talent in San Francisco to not embarrass himself. I think he will eventually go back to coaching at the collegiate level. Michigan or some other glamour program will introduce Jim Harbaugh as its head coach sometime between 2013 and 2015. And, like Rick Pitino, achieve his greatest success there.
Tuesday, December 7, 2010
Sins of the Father
Yesterday, the NCAA ruled that they had reinstituted Cam Newton’s eligibility after he had been ruled ineligible the previous day. We could spend months discussing the ridiculousness of that, but what I find more asinine and self-righteous is the media’s reaction to the NCAA’s ruling. In the past day, I’ve read a lot of stories about the decision, and all of the authors came to the same conclusion: while protecting the student-athlete, the NCAA set a dangerous precedent and created a loophole supplying a convenient excuse for anyone who faces allegations in the future. I even read one article about USC athletic director Pat Haden’s anger and confusion over the ruling. What no one seems to realize—what they refuse to acknowledge is probably more accurate—is what their stance asks of people.
We are talking about college students. Recruited football players are 17 or 18. In the case of transfers like Cam Newton, they are 18, 19, or 20. Newton was 20 during the time Mississippi State, Auburn, and others were recruiting him last fall.
When Cecil Newton, Cam’s father, requested money in exchange for sending his son to a certain school, he, according to NCAA rules, compromised Cam’s eligibility. According to the technicalities of the rules, whether or not Cam knew what his father was doing is irrelevant to the issue of his eligibility. Frankly, it shouldn’t be relevant. What say does a teenager or 20-year old have over what his/her parents do? Did you govern your parents’ actions when you were that age? Do you govern your parents’ actions now?
Do people actually expect Cam Newton or any other athlete—any other person of that age, for that matter—to stop a parent from breaking a rule? “No mother, no father, do not do that. It is wrong and unfair.” People in the media are actually judging Cam Newton guilty for his inability to speak those sentences to his father and keep his parent from breaking a rule.
In truth, that last point is irrelevant too. According to the rule, once Cecil Newton asked for money, Cam’s eligibility was already compromised. Cam stepping to his father and demanding that he follow all the rules to the full letter would be—again, according to the rule—too little, too late. By that point, the rule was already broken and Cam Newton’s eligibility was already compromised.
It is important to keep in mind that we are talking about an NCAA rule here. No law was broken by Cecil Newton asking for money. It is also important to recognize that, as far as anybody knows right now, no money was actually exchanged. Cecil Newton asked for money from Mississippi State. There are no allegations or accusations that he sought money from any other school. Cam Newton did not go to Mississippi State. The man went to Auburn. In short, no transaction has been made—as far as anybody knows.
Let me ask another question: did your parents tell you everything they were doing? Of course they didn’t. Your parents even kept things that are 100% about you from you. They still do. Yet, the mass media seems to be certain that Cam Newton had to know. Why? What reason would he have to know? Why would Cecil Newton tell his son? If you were doing something against the rules, would you tell your child? If you would, I have little to no respect for your intellect.
David Whitley of Fanhouse wrote, “Only a semi-complete moron could be oblivious to a father like Cecil Newton treating him like an eBay item.” I don’t know. Although I doubt it, this could be a generational or cultural thing. In my house, my parents told me nothing of their plans or financial affairs. I was neither consulted nor notified before we moved; they would just come to me one day and tell me it was time to start packing. I didn’t know ahead of time when they were buying a new car. I have no idea how much money my parents ever earned at their jobs, paid for a car, paid for a house, paid for a vacation, or anything else. It was their money, not mine. It was none of my business. Whatever money Cecil Newton did or did not receive from a college was his, not Cam’s. What reason would Cecil Newton ever have to say anything to his son? And to think that he couldn’t have done all this without his son knowing is akin to calling the man an idiot. Even if Cecil and Cam had lived in the same house, it would be easy for the son to be completely left out of the loop. But let us not forget that the two men did not live together last school year. Cecil was home in Georgia while Cam attended junior college in Texas.
What I also fail to understand is what difference it makes whether Cam knew or not. Say, for instance, that he knew his father’s doings. What exactly was the kid supposed to do? Realistically, what was Cam Newton supposed to do? Was he supposed to call up the NCAA and tattle on his father? Would it really be the right thing for him to bring to light the compromising of his collegiate eligibility? The results of that would have been denying himself an opportunity at a college education—if that happens to be important to him—creating discord in his home, and showing his parents that they cannot trust him. Would that have been the right thing? You wanted him to do that? When not a single law was broken?
In what world do teenagers do this to their parents? In what world to teenagers get anywhere telling their parents what to do? What planet are these people from? I’m from earth, and it doesn’t work that way here.
Taking all of this into account, why would anyone concentrate on whether or not Cam Newton knew what his father was doing?
My issue with the NCAA’s ruling in the Cam Newton case is a little different from the mass media’s. The NCAA reinstated Newton’s eligibility because their current evidence does not show that the player had any knowledge of his father’s seeking money. I believe the athlete’s knowledge of a parent’s rule breaking should have no bearing on whether or not he/she is ruled eligible to play. It makes more sense to me if eligibility is determined by whether or not the player received a benefit.
When a parent, guardian, or anyone else associated with a student-athlete shakes down a coach or booster for money, cars, jobs, houses, and/or other illicit benefits, he/she is acting in his/her own interests. Remember in He Got Game when Jesus Shuttlesworth’s uncle stated his demands for a piece of the pie? What about Blue Chips when Ricky Roe’s father wanted a new tractor. In neither case was there any compensation for the athlete himself.
When the rumors first started regarding Cecil Newton attempting to sell his son’s services, the media jumped on the fact that Cecil Newton’s church was in trouble with the local municipal government. The building faced demolition unless a large number of repairs were made. Most people, including me, believe that Cam Newton went to Auburn because the Alabama school offered more money than did Mississippi State. Yet, there is no car, no new house, no new job, no jewelry—just a church in need of money. Even if we go with the assumption that Auburn paid the Newtons, what benefit did this money provide to Cam?
How can we, as a society, even remotely justify punishing these kids for things that the adults in their lives do? We can’t. Yet, we’re punishing them anyway. Even worse, we’re raging when these kids are not punished.
In justifying the NCAA’s decision to let Cam Newton play, SEC commissioner Mike Slive said, “We must consider the young person’s responsibility.” Whitley’s response to that statement was, “Since when?” The other columnists wrote similar things. The majority of the American sports media feels the same way:
As stupid as Baxter’s suspension was, he actually received what is considered a benefit. To this day, we still see no benefit that Cam Newton received or was set up to receive. Had a car come into his possession, we would have found out about it by now. We would also know about any other tangible benefit he would have received. If he received cash, where did it go? We all know college students aren’t good at holding onto money. Besides, what use would there be for Cam to receive money if he was just going to save it? This doesn’t make any sense at all.
Whatever happened between Cecil Newton and Mississippi State, Auburn, and whoever else resulted in nothing for Cam. Yet, the college football public is crying loudly for the man to be punished.
Only in America can people cry out injustice because a late teen/early twenty-something is not punished for the sins of his father. Only in America can people fill with rage when a college student who has received nothing goes unpunished when the adults around him try to make a buck.
But comparing it to a slave system would make me the bad guy.
We are talking about college students. Recruited football players are 17 or 18. In the case of transfers like Cam Newton, they are 18, 19, or 20. Newton was 20 during the time Mississippi State, Auburn, and others were recruiting him last fall.
When Cecil Newton, Cam’s father, requested money in exchange for sending his son to a certain school, he, according to NCAA rules, compromised Cam’s eligibility. According to the technicalities of the rules, whether or not Cam knew what his father was doing is irrelevant to the issue of his eligibility. Frankly, it shouldn’t be relevant. What say does a teenager or 20-year old have over what his/her parents do? Did you govern your parents’ actions when you were that age? Do you govern your parents’ actions now?
Do people actually expect Cam Newton or any other athlete—any other person of that age, for that matter—to stop a parent from breaking a rule? “No mother, no father, do not do that. It is wrong and unfair.” People in the media are actually judging Cam Newton guilty for his inability to speak those sentences to his father and keep his parent from breaking a rule.
In truth, that last point is irrelevant too. According to the rule, once Cecil Newton asked for money, Cam’s eligibility was already compromised. Cam stepping to his father and demanding that he follow all the rules to the full letter would be—again, according to the rule—too little, too late. By that point, the rule was already broken and Cam Newton’s eligibility was already compromised.
It is important to keep in mind that we are talking about an NCAA rule here. No law was broken by Cecil Newton asking for money. It is also important to recognize that, as far as anybody knows right now, no money was actually exchanged. Cecil Newton asked for money from Mississippi State. There are no allegations or accusations that he sought money from any other school. Cam Newton did not go to Mississippi State. The man went to Auburn. In short, no transaction has been made—as far as anybody knows.
Let me ask another question: did your parents tell you everything they were doing? Of course they didn’t. Your parents even kept things that are 100% about you from you. They still do. Yet, the mass media seems to be certain that Cam Newton had to know. Why? What reason would he have to know? Why would Cecil Newton tell his son? If you were doing something against the rules, would you tell your child? If you would, I have little to no respect for your intellect.
David Whitley of Fanhouse wrote, “Only a semi-complete moron could be oblivious to a father like Cecil Newton treating him like an eBay item.” I don’t know. Although I doubt it, this could be a generational or cultural thing. In my house, my parents told me nothing of their plans or financial affairs. I was neither consulted nor notified before we moved; they would just come to me one day and tell me it was time to start packing. I didn’t know ahead of time when they were buying a new car. I have no idea how much money my parents ever earned at their jobs, paid for a car, paid for a house, paid for a vacation, or anything else. It was their money, not mine. It was none of my business. Whatever money Cecil Newton did or did not receive from a college was his, not Cam’s. What reason would Cecil Newton ever have to say anything to his son? And to think that he couldn’t have done all this without his son knowing is akin to calling the man an idiot. Even if Cecil and Cam had lived in the same house, it would be easy for the son to be completely left out of the loop. But let us not forget that the two men did not live together last school year. Cecil was home in Georgia while Cam attended junior college in Texas.
What I also fail to understand is what difference it makes whether Cam knew or not. Say, for instance, that he knew his father’s doings. What exactly was the kid supposed to do? Realistically, what was Cam Newton supposed to do? Was he supposed to call up the NCAA and tattle on his father? Would it really be the right thing for him to bring to light the compromising of his collegiate eligibility? The results of that would have been denying himself an opportunity at a college education—if that happens to be important to him—creating discord in his home, and showing his parents that they cannot trust him. Would that have been the right thing? You wanted him to do that? When not a single law was broken?
In what world do teenagers do this to their parents? In what world to teenagers get anywhere telling their parents what to do? What planet are these people from? I’m from earth, and it doesn’t work that way here.
Taking all of this into account, why would anyone concentrate on whether or not Cam Newton knew what his father was doing?
My issue with the NCAA’s ruling in the Cam Newton case is a little different from the mass media’s. The NCAA reinstated Newton’s eligibility because their current evidence does not show that the player had any knowledge of his father’s seeking money. I believe the athlete’s knowledge of a parent’s rule breaking should have no bearing on whether or not he/she is ruled eligible to play. It makes more sense to me if eligibility is determined by whether or not the player received a benefit.
When a parent, guardian, or anyone else associated with a student-athlete shakes down a coach or booster for money, cars, jobs, houses, and/or other illicit benefits, he/she is acting in his/her own interests. Remember in He Got Game when Jesus Shuttlesworth’s uncle stated his demands for a piece of the pie? What about Blue Chips when Ricky Roe’s father wanted a new tractor. In neither case was there any compensation for the athlete himself.
When the rumors first started regarding Cecil Newton attempting to sell his son’s services, the media jumped on the fact that Cecil Newton’s church was in trouble with the local municipal government. The building faced demolition unless a large number of repairs were made. Most people, including me, believe that Cam Newton went to Auburn because the Alabama school offered more money than did Mississippi State. Yet, there is no car, no new house, no new job, no jewelry—just a church in need of money. Even if we go with the assumption that Auburn paid the Newtons, what benefit did this money provide to Cam?
How can we, as a society, even remotely justify punishing these kids for things that the adults in their lives do? We can’t. Yet, we’re punishing them anyway. Even worse, we’re raging when these kids are not punished.
In justifying the NCAA’s decision to let Cam Newton play, SEC commissioner Mike Slive said, “We must consider the young person’s responsibility.” Whitley’s response to that statement was, “Since when?” The other columnists wrote similar things. The majority of the American sports media feels the same way:
Gene Wojciechowski of ESPN:Staples also wrote that Southern California tailback Dillon Baxter, “should be furious.” USC held Baxter out of a game after Baxter was caught catching a golf cart ride onto campus from a classmate who is also a registered agent. The cases of Newton and Baxter are only similar in that they involve current college football players. The scenarios are entirely different.
Huh? Did the NCAA do what I think it did? Did it basically rule that a father and a third party can actively, brazenly and with impunity shop a player around for hundreds of thousands of dollars—and the worst thing that happens is the father has to lie low and the third party has to disassociate himself from the programs in question?
Did it just get embarrassed by a rules loophole the size of Jordan-Hare Stadium, the gist of it being: Your old man and another guy can put you on the open market, but as long as you don't know about it, you're good to strap it up for the next big game?
The answers: yes and yes.
Dan Wetzel of Yahoo! Sports quotes Sonny Vaccaro:
The NCAA just gave cover to every middle man in the country. The kids never know. In all my years, I've never heard of a kid being involved in the negotiation. You think they ask? Of course not. Their mom asks. Their coach asks. Their cousin asks. This is crazy.
Kalani Simpson of Fox Sports:
I was probably the last guy outside of the state of Alabama to give Cam Newton the benefit of the doubt that maybe he wasn’t being shopped around for cash. But apparently the NCAA is really, really, really giving the benefit of the doubt—yeah, he was being shopped around for cash. But the kid didn’t know about it, so he’s clean.
Thayer Evans, also of Fox Sports quoted an unnamed college football coach:
What they’re saying is as long as the kid has nothing to do with the solicitation then you’re OK. It's a joke, man. This blows everything wide open. Now, it really becomes the haves and the have-nots. It'll be everybody doing the SEC money thing, but all across the country. Here we go. Get ready. With all this, how can they possibly give that kid the Heisman Trophy after we got embarrassed with Reggie Bush? This is just a farce.
Andy Staples wrote of CNNSI.com:
…by doing the right thing based on the available evidence, the NCAA has opened a gaping loophole in its own enforcement process. Any player who is for sale during his recruitment now may shift blame to a parent, an uncle or a crooked family friend and say, “Well, you let Cam Newton play.”
As stupid as Baxter’s suspension was, he actually received what is considered a benefit. To this day, we still see no benefit that Cam Newton received or was set up to receive. Had a car come into his possession, we would have found out about it by now. We would also know about any other tangible benefit he would have received. If he received cash, where did it go? We all know college students aren’t good at holding onto money. Besides, what use would there be for Cam to receive money if he was just going to save it? This doesn’t make any sense at all.
Whatever happened between Cecil Newton and Mississippi State, Auburn, and whoever else resulted in nothing for Cam. Yet, the college football public is crying loudly for the man to be punished.
Only in America can people cry out injustice because a late teen/early twenty-something is not punished for the sins of his father. Only in America can people fill with rage when a college student who has received nothing goes unpunished when the adults around him try to make a buck.
But comparing it to a slave system would make me the bad guy.
Thursday, December 2, 2010
Heisman Quarterblack
When I first heard the reports that surfaced two months ago that Auburn quarterback Cam Newton was suspected to be part of a pay-for-play scheme, I immediately thought about the Heisman Trophy. Newton, both then and now, is the front-runner to win the 2010 award. Although I hadn’t thought about it consciously, but I knew not many Black quarterbacks had won the Heisman Trophy. I looked it up and saw that the number was three. 3. I decided to dig a little deeper, and I found a few interesting things.
As November transitions into December each year since 2000, I have noticed that the biggest factor in making one a Heisman Trophy candidate seemed to be quarterbacking the national championship contenders. Whether or not that quarterback was good or not—or even played well or not—he was always a candidate. The most ridiculous examples of this are the 2000 and 2001 winners. Chris Weinke and Eric Crouch had absolutely no business winning the Heisman Trophy.
What made the Crouch choice so egregious in my opinion is that he won as a running quarterback who was well below average as a passer. So many Black quarterbacks have come and gone who have been and continue to be criticized for being “running quarterbacks” or guys who “aren’t real quarterbacks.” This racist stigma affected guys like Tommy Frazier, Jamelle Holieway, Darian Hagan, Michael Vick, Donovan McNabb, and many others. This year, two men have been attacked by such innuendo. At the beginning of the season, Denard Robinson of Michigan was the most dominant player in the country. Robinson is the only player in college football history to have at least 200 yards running and 200 yards passing in the same game on more than one occasion. He achieved the feat twice in the first five weeks of the season! On top of that, Robinson’s season also includes two more games with at least 185 yards rushing and 190 yards passing. The point is that Denard Robinson was a beast. Yet, all the talk around the country was that Denard Robinson was not a real quarterback.
As the season progressed, Cam Newton developed and has become, without question, the best college football player in the country. Anything less than winning the Heisman by the five widest margins ever would be criminal. Newton has Auburn on track to play in the BCS National Championship Game despite not being particularly good in any aspect of the game outside of their quarterback.
But, cynical as I am, I’ve been expecting something to happen. I fully expected all the stops to be pulled out. As great as Cam Newton has been this season, his style of play is not overly accepted from a Black quarterback. Like Denard Robinson earlier this season, Newton is viewed as a running quarterback. Running quarterback do not win the Heisman Trophy unless they are White. They just don’t. I’ll put it this way: during his senior year at Purdue, Drew Brees rushed for 182 yards more than did the most prolific rushing Heisman Trophy winning Black quarterback. Drew Bress…182 more yards. Are you kidding me?
This required me to dig even deeper. I went back and looked at every quarterback since 1986 who either finished in the top four of the Heisman voting, played for a national championship, or had an altogether great season that could or should have earned a top four Heisman finish. What I found was interesting. Before I get into the details, here is a list of the quarterbacks who fall into the categories I listed above as well as their respective team and Heisman voting finishes (for years prior to 1998, BCS means that the quarterback’s team played in the Cotton Bowl or one of the four bowls that are now part of the BCS):
If you really want to see the full statistics on all these guys, check the end of this post. Here is a breakdown:
The three Black quarterbacks who have won the Heisman Trophy are all on that list. Andre Ware, CharlieWard, and Troy Smith all had transcendent seasons during the years they won the award. Ware threw 46 touchdowns against only 15 interceptions during his Heisman winning season. That represented 1 touchdown less than the record at the time (Jim McMahon threw 47 touchdowns and 18 interceptions in 1980). Ware’s 4,699 passing yards in 1989 also represented an NCAA record at the time. It may not look like much today, but in 1989, Andre Ware’s season represented the very best season any quarterback had ever experienced. As he said during his Heisman acceptance speech, Ware had “a Barry Sanders type season.” There was no choice but to give him college football’s most prestigious honor.
In 1993, Charlie Ward took collegiate quarterbacking to the next level. While leading Florida State to the school’s first national championship, Ward threw 27 touchdown passes and only 4 interceptions while throwing for more than 3,000 yards. During my research, I was unable to find an earlier case of a major college quarterback with at least 25 touchdown passes and five and fewer interceptions in the same season. Ward’s was a truly historic season, and it was rewarded with the second widest (to O.J. Simpson) voting margin in Heisman Trophy history. He was on a level all his own.
It would be thirteen years before another Black quarterback, Troy Smith, won the Heisman. Smith led a Buckeye team that was ranked #1 in every poll every single week of the regular season. That Ohio State team also won two overly hyped #1 vs. #2 matchups during the season, including the single most hyped and anticipated Ohio State vs. Michigan game ever. Smith’s 30 to 6 touchdown to interception ratio and ability to appear in control over everything that happened on the field added to his reputation as college football’s best leader. That team leaned on him for everything, and until the national championship game, he always delivered. By the time December rolled around, Troy Smith was an obvious Heisman choice.
What Andre Ware, Charlie Ward, and Troy Smith all had in common was that none of the three were runners. With 339 yards in 1993, Charlie Ward is the most prolific rushing Black quarterback to win the Heisman. Smith ran for 204 yards during his Heisman winning season. Ware finished 1989 with negative rushing yards. Taking all the stereotypes about Black quarterbacks into consideration, how ironic is it that no Heisman Trophy winning Black quarterback has run for as many as 35 yards per game.
By contrast, 4 of the White Heisman winning quarterbacks rushed for positive yardage. Two of them, Eric Crouch in 2001 and Tim Tebow in 2008, ran for more than 800 yards during their award winning seasons. Crouch ran for 1115 yards and 18 touchdowns while Tebow posted totals of 895 and 23. To his credit, Tebow also passed for 3,286 yards, 32 touchdowns, and 6 interceptions. That stands on its own as a great passing season. Crouch’s passing totals, on the other hand, were far below par: only 1,510 yards, 7 touchdowns, and 10 interceptions. Crouch won the Heisman Trophy during a season in which he was a bad passer.
None of this surprises me. I know that for White quarterbacks, the ability to run is viewed as an added dimension to their games. They are considered versatile. Black quarterbacks who run, however, are seen as athletes playing the quarterback position. They are widely considered unintelligent and unable to read defenses. For them, the ability to run is viewed as a negative. It was that way when I was a kid; it remains that way today. To date, every Black quarterback with a significant number of rushing yards has been denied the Heisman Trophy. The voters have shown no hesitation to vote these men in the top four—some even are voted runner-up—but they are never awarded college football’s most prestigious individual honor. The numbers on this, as detailed in the table below, are overwhelming:
Let’s think about this. Black quarterbacks have been criticized for being run-first for decades, yet Eric Crouch and Tim Tebow were hailed for being dual-threat quarterbacks. Guys like Tommy Frazier, Don McPherson, Pat White, and Michael Vick were not rewarded for being as good and, in many cases, better than Crouch and Tebow were.
The statistic that I find most surprising is that there have been more Black quarterbacks than White quarterbacks to finish second in the Heisman voting since 1986. White winners outnumber Black winners 11-3, yet Black runners-up outnumber White runners-up 7-6. By my count, 4 of the 7 Black runners-up should have won the award. A fifth runner-up, Joey Hamilton in 1999, finished ahead of another Black quarterback, Michael Vick, who should have been the rightful Heisman winner.
Five of those 7 runners-up rushed for more than yards than Charlie Ward did during his Heisman winning season. Four of them totaled more than 500 yards. At the same time, only 1 of the 6 White runners-up rushed for more than 500 yards. Among quarterbacks who finished third and fourth in the Heisman balloting, 84% of White quarterbacks rushed for less than 300 yards while 80% of Black quarterbacks rushed for more than 500. It’s as if the criteria for winning the Heisman and merely placing high in the voting are completely different for Black quarterbacks. I do not believe any of this is a coincidence. Black quarterbacks who want to win the Heisman Trophy have to be and play a certain way.
None of this is clandestine or subtle. We can go year by year and see how and when Black quarterbacks were kept out of the Heisman winners club. In fact, let me do that.
Because everything in college football changed drastically when the Bowl Championship Series (BCS) was implemented in 1998, I feel the need to examine the Heisman travesties in the pre BCS and BCS eras separately. In the years between 1986 and 1998, the biggest Heisman injustices occurred in 1987, 1990, 1992, and 1995. The most egregious Heisman decisions during the BCS era took place in 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, and—based solely on Heisman voting patterns—2007. Yes, I believe there have been ten horrendously awarded Heisman Trophies in the past 25 years. I’ll go through each one of them.
1987 Tim Brown of Notre Dame became the first wide receiver to win the Heisman. Don McPherson of Syracuse was the runner up. McPherson led the Orangemen to an undefeated season despite little offensive talent other than himself. Winning would have made McPherson the first Black quarterback to win the award. Brown’s victory has been criticized as the result of a Notre Dame bias.
1990 Ty Detmer won the award over Raghib Ismail and Eric Bienemy. At the time, many thought Rocket Ismail was robbed of the award, but his placing second was, in my opinion, another result of the Notre Dame bias. As the best player on the nation’s best team, I thought Bienemy should have been the winner during a season with no truly transcendent player. Yes, Detmer threw for over 5,000 yards, but no quarterback who throws 28 interceptions in a single season should ever win the Heisman Trophy.
1992 Gino Torretta won the award because he was the starting quarterback for a Miami Hurricanes team that was poised to complete a second consecutive undefeated national championship season. The truth, however, was that Torretta was the team’s weak link. Running backs Marshall Faulk of San Diego State and Garrison Hearst of Georgia were far and away the most deserving candidates that year.
1995 Eddie George of Ohio State was the 1995 winner. He had a very good season, but it was not great. George did nothing transcendent or memorable that year. Although he came close, he did not surpass the 2,000 yard mark. He had several 200 yard rushing days, but he did nothing truly special. Tommy Frazier, on the other hand, was the best player on what many experts still consider the best team in college football history. A legitimate argument can be made that Frazier is the best college quarterback of the past 30 years. The closest comparison I can make between him and a player from a different sport is Mark Messier. Entering, 1995, Frazier was already a two-time national championship game MVP. During that season, he led the most powerful, dominating, and devastating offense the sport has ever seen. Frazier’s not winning is a clear case of the voters not wanting to give the Heisman to a Black quarterback who was not considered a “real” quarterback.
The BCS brought in an era of guaranteeing that the #1 and #2 teams would meet for the national championship at the end of every season. Under the old bowl system, conference ties were the primary force behind teams’ bowl bids. There were many cases of top three teams in the polls playing in three different bowls. The BCS ended those days. With so much emphasis on the new true BCS National Championship Game, everything else was devalued. This affected the Heisman voters. Only 4 of the 11 Heisman winners in the years immediately prior to the BCS era played for a national championship. 8 of the 12 Heisman winners since have done so.
The first two Heisman winners of the BCS era, running backs Ricky Williams and Ron Dayne, won the award in 1998 and 1999, respectively, after seasons during which they set the all-time Division I-A career rushing record. Williams’ Texas team played in the Cotton Bowl; Dayne’s Wisconsin Badgers played in the Rose Bowl. Carson Palmer won the 2002 Heisman; his USC reached the Orange Bowl. In 2007, Tim Tebow won the trophy and played in the Capital One Bowl. Every other Heisman winner since 1998 played in the BCS National Championship Game that season. As such, it has become commonly accepted that the Heisman is now awarded to either the quarterback of the best team or record-breaking running back and no longer the best skill position player in the country. This, of course, has led to a large number of Heisman voting atrocities:
1998 With over 2,000 yards and 27 touchdowns, Ricky Williams had a great year running the ball for the Longhorns. What Michael Bishop did in Manhattan, Kansas, though, was legendary. Bishop threw 23 touchdowns against only 4 interceptions while running for 748 yards and 14 touchdowns while leading Kansas State to the only undefeated regular season in the program’s history. Only a double-overtime defeat kept the Wildcats from playing Tennessee for the first BCS National Championship. Williams’ winning the Heisman was more of a career award—he broke the career rushing record in the season finale—than for the 1998 season. He was not the most outstanding player in the country that year; he was only the second-best in his own conference.
1999 Like Ricky Williams did one season earlier, Ron Dayne won the Heisman on the strength of breaking the career rushing record during the season. Dayne’s 1999 season was not great. Joey Hamilton’s, on the other hand, was. In 1999, Hamilton completed two-thirds of his passes for over 3,000 yards, threw 29 touchdown passes, and ran for more than 700 yards. He was the runner-up. But even he was not the most outstanding player in the country. That was Michael Vick, who, as a freshman, led Virginia Tech to the brink of a national championship. Vick’s numbers don’t tell the whole story, but he was clearly the best player in the country. Everyone acknowledged as much. Yet he only finished third.
2000 Chris Weinke won because there was no obvious strong candidate and he was the best quarterback among the national championship contenders. Like Gino Torretta before him, Weinke was his team’s weak link. He was the biggest reason Florida State did not win a second consecutive championship that year. In my opinion, Drew Brees was the most deserving candidate. Brees led his Purdue team to the Rose Bowl, but the Boilermakers won a weak Big Ten. At no point were they ranked higher than 9th. This past generation has shown that a Heisman winner will not come from a team that bad.
2001 Eric Crouch may be the least deserving Heisman winner of my lifetime. We’ve already taken a look at his passing statistics. But he did run for more than 1,100 yards on the season. And he had a signature play during Nebraska’s upset of top-ranked Oklahoma when he caught a touchdown pass during a trick play. But his passing was a major liability for the Cornhuskers. This was proven in their season finale at Colorado when the Buffaloes jumped ahead early and Nebraska did not have the passing attack required to catch up. Colorado ended up winning 62-36. In the BCS National Championship Game, Miami made Crouch look like a junior varsity quarterback. I felt that Rex Grossman of Florida and Joey Harrington of Oregon were the most deserving candidates. The excuse given for voting against Grossman was that he was a sophomore and no underclassman had yet won the Heisman. Harrington did not win because of a well-publicized bias against players from the West Coast.
2002 All the talk leading up to the Heisman Trophy announcement was whether or not Carson Palmer was a legitimate candidate to win. That West Coast bias had prevented any player from west of the Rocky Mountains from winning the award since 1981. He wasn’t even considered among the favorites. Willis McGahee, Ken Dorsey, and Brad Banks were expected to finish first and second. I actually expected Penn State’s Larry Johnson to win. I know that McGahee and Dorsey would cancel each other and that Banks couldn’t win. But Palmer won. It stunned a lot of people. It should have annoyed people. Palmer’s season was nowhere near the same level as Banks’. Brad Banks controlled the Big Ten season in 2002. That Iowa team had no business competing in the conference, yet they went undefeated in the Big Ten. Palmer was the better pro prospect and outplayed Banks in the Orange Bowl, but Brad Banks was the best player during the regular season. The Heisman should have been his, but the so-called West Coast bias was broken.
2007 This was Tim Tebow’s Heisman year. How many Heisman taboos were broken with this one? They used to say that no underclassman could win the Heisman. Tebow became the first sophomore to win it. After Ricky Williams won the first Heisman Trophy of the BCS era, no player had won the award without playing in a BCS bowl. Tebow’s Florida team earned a trip to the Capital One Bowl. Tebow also became the first Heisman Trophy winner of the BCS era to play for a team that lost more than two regular season games. A big deal was made about Tebow becoming the first player in college football history to throw for 20 touchdowns and run for 20 touchdowns in the same season. That is a truly great achievement, and Tebow had a great year, but he did not deserve the Heisman. Dennis Dixon was the best player in the nation. But he got hurt in the first quarter of the tenth game of the season—Oregon went on to lose out for the remainder of the regular season—and a player who misses 25% of the season can’t win the award. Pat White also had a great season while leading West Virginia to the Big East championship. White’s numbers weren’t as gaudy as Tebow’s, but he won games. We always hear about how quarterbacks are judged by wins and losses, yet Tim Tebow won the Heisman Trophy during a season in which he led the defending national champions to a 9-3 record and finished 3rd in the SEC East. This man, who became the very first underclassman to win the award and was force fed down our throats as a representative of all that is right and good with this world, is the only Heisman winner of the past 11 years to not play in the BCS. You have to look all the way back to Tim Brown’s season in 1987 to find a Heisman winner to play on a team with as many losses as Tebow’s Florida Gators. How exactly did Tebow win the award? I’m not saying that he didn’t deserve to win it—I probably would have voted for him after Dixon was injured—but the voters had just spent the previous decade establishing criteria that Tebow did not meet.
What has occurred during the BCS era is that only four men have won the Heisman Trophy without playing on a team that played in the BCS National Championship Game. In each of those four seasons, a Black quarterback should have been the rightful winner of the trophy. But we see these things occur over and over every day of our lives. Certain rules apply until they don’t. Michael Vick can’t win the Heisman in 1999 because underclassmen don’t win, but Tim Tebow, Sam Bradford, and Mark Ingram can win as sophomores. There is a West Coast bias keeping players from winning the Heisman, but Carson Palmer can win despite playing one game on national television during a season in which his team was never a contender for the championship. The Heisman goes to the best player on the best team, but Tebow can win despite his team finishing third in its division within its conference. Option quarterbacks can’t win because they don’t throw the ball well enough, but Eric Crouch can win even though he threw more interceptions than touchdowns. Quarterbacks who turn the ball over can’t win, but Ty Detmer can win fairly comfortably while throwing 28 interceptions.
All this is why I fully expected the arrival of controversy regarding Cam Newton. Newton is by far the best player in the nation. He is nearly as obvious a choice for the Heisman as Barry Sanders was in 1988. There is no way to even fabricate an on-field argument for denying him the trophy, so off-field issues are the only way to stop him.
Cam Newton is exactly the kind of Black quarterback who has never been able to win the Heisman. To date, he has a four to one touchdown to interception ration while completing 67.9% of his passes. He has also rushed for greater than 1,300 yards so far. On top of that, he holds the Auburn records for passing touchdowns and rushing touchdowns in a season. He is on the verge of matching Tebow’s 2007 feat of throwing and rushing for 20 touchdowns in a season. And his team, despite a historically bad pass defense, is undefeated. Cam Newton is in the midst of the greatest season by a college quarterback in my lifetime. So, yeah, they were going to come after him. And even though the NCAA has ruled him eligible, some in the media are still coming after him.
How much of the Cam Newton drama is the result of jealous former suitors like Mississippi State and Florida watching him lead a rival to college football’s promised land? How much of this controversy is because people don’t want to see a guy who’s not a “real” quarterback win the Heisman Trophy? How much of this is just the natural occurrence in a sport that is most dominant in the most racially segregated and disharmonious areas of our country? How much of that is because Newton is widely viewed as the anti-Tebow? One year ago, people were making the argument that Tim Tebow was the greatest college football player ever. Now, we see that Tebow was not even the best quarterback in his own conference over the past five years.
And, finally, why hasn’t anyone looked at Cam Newton’s troubles over the past two months from this standpoint? He plays in the SEC, a conference that has only had one non-White head football coach in its history. These folks will be damned before they let a running Negro quarterback win the Heisman Trophy on their watch.
As November transitions into December each year since 2000, I have noticed that the biggest factor in making one a Heisman Trophy candidate seemed to be quarterbacking the national championship contenders. Whether or not that quarterback was good or not—or even played well or not—he was always a candidate. The most ridiculous examples of this are the 2000 and 2001 winners. Chris Weinke and Eric Crouch had absolutely no business winning the Heisman Trophy.
What made the Crouch choice so egregious in my opinion is that he won as a running quarterback who was well below average as a passer. So many Black quarterbacks have come and gone who have been and continue to be criticized for being “running quarterbacks” or guys who “aren’t real quarterbacks.” This racist stigma affected guys like Tommy Frazier, Jamelle Holieway, Darian Hagan, Michael Vick, Donovan McNabb, and many others. This year, two men have been attacked by such innuendo. At the beginning of the season, Denard Robinson of Michigan was the most dominant player in the country. Robinson is the only player in college football history to have at least 200 yards running and 200 yards passing in the same game on more than one occasion. He achieved the feat twice in the first five weeks of the season! On top of that, Robinson’s season also includes two more games with at least 185 yards rushing and 190 yards passing. The point is that Denard Robinson was a beast. Yet, all the talk around the country was that Denard Robinson was not a real quarterback.
As the season progressed, Cam Newton developed and has become, without question, the best college football player in the country. Anything less than winning the Heisman by the five widest margins ever would be criminal. Newton has Auburn on track to play in the BCS National Championship Game despite not being particularly good in any aspect of the game outside of their quarterback.
But, cynical as I am, I’ve been expecting something to happen. I fully expected all the stops to be pulled out. As great as Cam Newton has been this season, his style of play is not overly accepted from a Black quarterback. Like Denard Robinson earlier this season, Newton is viewed as a running quarterback. Running quarterback do not win the Heisman Trophy unless they are White. They just don’t. I’ll put it this way: during his senior year at Purdue, Drew Brees rushed for 182 yards more than did the most prolific rushing Heisman Trophy winning Black quarterback. Drew Bress…182 more yards. Are you kidding me?
This required me to dig even deeper. I went back and looked at every quarterback since 1986 who either finished in the top four of the Heisman voting, played for a national championship, or had an altogether great season that could or should have earned a top four Heisman finish. What I found was interesting. Before I get into the details, here is a list of the quarterbacks who fall into the categories I listed above as well as their respective team and Heisman voting finishes (for years prior to 1998, BCS means that the quarterback’s team played in the Cotton Bowl or one of the four bowls that are now part of the BCS):
| Name | Year | College | Team Finish | Heisman Finish |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jamelle Holieway | 1986 | Oklahoma | Championship Contender | N/A |
| Jim Harbaugh | 1986 | Michigan | BCS | 3rd |
| Vinny Testaverde | 1986 | Miami (FL) | Championship Runner-Up | Winner |
| Jamelle Holieway | 1987 | Oklahoma | Championship Runner-Up | N/A |
| Don McPherson | 1987 | Syracuse | Championship Contender | 2nd |
| Tony Rice | 1988 | Notre Dame | National Champion | N/A |
| Major Harris | 1988 | West Virginia | Championship Runner-Up | 5th |
| Steve Walsh | 1988 | Miami (FL) | Championship Contender | 4th |
| Troy Aikman | 1988 | UCLA | Top 25 | 3rd |
| Rodney Peete | 1988 | USC | Championship Contender | 2nd |
| Darian Hagan | 1989 | Colorado | Championship Runner-Up | 5th |
| Tony Rice | 1989 | Notre Dame | Championship Contender | 4th |
| Major Harris | 1989 | West Virginia | Top 25 | 3rd |
| Andre Ware | 1989 | Houston | Top 25 | Winner |
| Darian Hagan | 1990 | Colorado | National Champion | 17th |
| Shawn Moore | 1990 | Virginia | BCS | 4th |
| Ty Detmer | 1990 | BYU | Top 25 | Winner |
| Ty Detmer | 1991 | BYU | Top 25 | 3rd |
| Casey Weldon | 1991 | Florida State | Championship Contender | 2nd |
| Gino Torretta | 1992 | Miami (FL) | Championship Runner-Up | Winner |
| Tommy Frazier | 1993 | Nebraska | Championship Runner-Up | N/A |
| Heath Shuler | 1993 | Tennessee | Top 25 | 2nd |
| Charlie Ward | 1993 | Florida State | National Champion | Winner |
| Kordell Steward | 1994 | Colorado | Championship Contender | 13th |
| Kerry Collins | 1994 | Penn State | Championship Runner-Up | 4th |
| Steve McNair | 1994 | Alcorn State | N/A (1-AA) | 3rd |
| Danny Wuerffel | 1995 | Florida | Championship Runner-Up | 3rd |
| Tommy Frazier | 1995 | Nebraska | National Champion | 2nd |
| Jake Plummer | 1996 | Arizona State | Runner-Up | 3rd |
| Danny Wuerffel | 1996 | Florida | National Champion | Winner |
| Ryan Leaf | 1997 | Washington State | BCS | 3rd |
| Peyton Manning | 1997 | Tennessee | BCS | 2nd |
| Donovan McNabb | 1998 | Syracuse | BCS | 5th |
| Tim Couch | 1998 | Kentucky | Minor Bowl | 4th |
| Cade McNown | 1998 | UCLA | Championship Contender | 3rd |
| Michael Bishop | 1998 | Kansas State | Championship Contender | 2nd |
| Drew Brees | 1999 | Purdue | Top 25 | 4th |
| Michael Vick | 1999 | Virginia Tech | Championship Runner-Up | 3rd |
| Joey Hamilton | 1999 | Georgia Tech | Top 25 | 2nd |
| Drew Brees | 2000 | Purdue | BCS | 3rd |
| Josh Heupel | 2000 | Oklahoma | National Champion | 2nd |
| Chris Weinke | 2000 | Florida State | Championship Runner-Up | Winner |
| Joey Harrington | 2001 | Oregon | Championship Contender | 4th |
| Ken Dorsey | 2001 | Miami (FL) | National Champion | 3rd |
| Rex Grossman | 2001 | Florida | BCS | 2nd |
| Eric Crouch | 2001 | Nebraska | Championship Runner-Up | Winner |
| Rex Grossman | 2002 | Florida | Championship Contender | N/A |
| Ken Dorsey | 2002 | Miami (FL) | Championship Runner-Up | 5th |
| Brad Banks | 2002 | Iowa | BCS | 2nd |
| Carson Palmer | 2002 | USC | BCS | Winner |
| Matt Leinart | 2003 | USC | National Champion | 6th |
| Eli Manning | 2003 | Mississippi | Top 25 | 3rd |
| Jason White | 2003 | Oklahoma | Championship Runner-Up | Winner |
| Alex Smith | 2004 | Utah | BCS | 4th |
| Jason White | 2004 | Oklahoma | Championship Runner-Up | 3rd |
| Matt Leinart | 2004 | USC | National Champion | Winner |
| Brady Quinn | 2005 | Notre Dame | BCS | 4th |
| Matt Leinart | 2005 | USC | Championship Runner-Up | 3rd |
| Vince Young | 2005 | Texas | National Champion | 2nd |
| Brady Quinn | 2006 | Notre Dame | BCS | 3rd |
| Troy Smith | 2006 | Ohio State | Championship Runner-Up | Winner |
| Dennis Dixon | 2007 | Oregon | Championship Contender | 5th |
| Chase Daniel | 2007 | Missouri | Championship Contender | 4th |
| Colt Brennan | 2007 | Hawaii | BCS | 3rd |
| Tim Tebow | 2007 | Florida | Top 25 | Winner |
| Graham Harrell | 2008 | Texas Tech | Top 25 | 4th |
| Tim Tebow | 2008 | Florida | National Champion | 3rd |
| Colt McCoy | 2008 | Texas | Championship Contender | 2nd |
| Sam Bradford | 2008 | Oklahoma | Championship Runner-Up | Winner |
| Tim Tebow | 2009 | Florida | Championship Contender | 5th |
| Colt McCoy | 2009 | Texas | Championship Runner-Up | 3rd |
- 77 total quarterback seasons
- 11 White Heisman winning quarterbacks
- 3 Black Heisman winning quarterbacks
- 6 White Heisman runners-up
- 7 Black Heisman runners-up
- 25 White quarterbacks who placed 3rd or 4th in Heisman voting
- 5 Black quarterbacks who placed 3rd or 4th in Heisman voting
- 5 quarterbacks who finished second in Heisman voting to another quarterback
- 10 quarterbacks who finished third in Heisman voting to another quarterback
- Three cases of quarterbacks finishing first, second, and third in Heisman voting
- 1989 – Andre Ware
- 1993 – Charlie Ward
- 1994 – Steve McNair
- 1995 – Tommie Frazier
- 1998 – Michael Bishop
- 1999 – Michael Vick
- 2003 – Matt Leinart
- 2003 – Jason White
- 2005 – Vince Young
- 2006 – Troy Smith
- 2007 – Dennis Dixon*
- 2007 – Tim Tebow
The three Black quarterbacks who have won the Heisman Trophy are all on that list. Andre Ware, CharlieWard, and Troy Smith all had transcendent seasons during the years they won the award. Ware threw 46 touchdowns against only 15 interceptions during his Heisman winning season. That represented 1 touchdown less than the record at the time (Jim McMahon threw 47 touchdowns and 18 interceptions in 1980). Ware’s 4,699 passing yards in 1989 also represented an NCAA record at the time. It may not look like much today, but in 1989, Andre Ware’s season represented the very best season any quarterback had ever experienced. As he said during his Heisman acceptance speech, Ware had “a Barry Sanders type season.” There was no choice but to give him college football’s most prestigious honor.
In 1993, Charlie Ward took collegiate quarterbacking to the next level. While leading Florida State to the school’s first national championship, Ward threw 27 touchdown passes and only 4 interceptions while throwing for more than 3,000 yards. During my research, I was unable to find an earlier case of a major college quarterback with at least 25 touchdown passes and five and fewer interceptions in the same season. Ward’s was a truly historic season, and it was rewarded with the second widest (to O.J. Simpson) voting margin in Heisman Trophy history. He was on a level all his own.
It would be thirteen years before another Black quarterback, Troy Smith, won the Heisman. Smith led a Buckeye team that was ranked #1 in every poll every single week of the regular season. That Ohio State team also won two overly hyped #1 vs. #2 matchups during the season, including the single most hyped and anticipated Ohio State vs. Michigan game ever. Smith’s 30 to 6 touchdown to interception ratio and ability to appear in control over everything that happened on the field added to his reputation as college football’s best leader. That team leaned on him for everything, and until the national championship game, he always delivered. By the time December rolled around, Troy Smith was an obvious Heisman choice.
What Andre Ware, Charlie Ward, and Troy Smith all had in common was that none of the three were runners. With 339 yards in 1993, Charlie Ward is the most prolific rushing Black quarterback to win the Heisman. Smith ran for 204 yards during his Heisman winning season. Ware finished 1989 with negative rushing yards. Taking all the stereotypes about Black quarterbacks into consideration, how ironic is it that no Heisman Trophy winning Black quarterback has run for as many as 35 yards per game.
By contrast, 4 of the White Heisman winning quarterbacks rushed for positive yardage. Two of them, Eric Crouch in 2001 and Tim Tebow in 2008, ran for more than 800 yards during their award winning seasons. Crouch ran for 1115 yards and 18 touchdowns while Tebow posted totals of 895 and 23. To his credit, Tebow also passed for 3,286 yards, 32 touchdowns, and 6 interceptions. That stands on its own as a great passing season. Crouch’s passing totals, on the other hand, were far below par: only 1,510 yards, 7 touchdowns, and 10 interceptions. Crouch won the Heisman Trophy during a season in which he was a bad passer.
None of this surprises me. I know that for White quarterbacks, the ability to run is viewed as an added dimension to their games. They are considered versatile. Black quarterbacks who run, however, are seen as athletes playing the quarterback position. They are widely considered unintelligent and unable to read defenses. For them, the ability to run is viewed as a negative. It was that way when I was a kid; it remains that way today. To date, every Black quarterback with a significant number of rushing yards has been denied the Heisman Trophy. The voters have shown no hesitation to vote these men in the top four—some even are voted runner-up—but they are never awarded college football’s most prestigious individual honor. The numbers on this, as detailed in the table below, are overwhelming:
| Category | Number | 0- yards | 0-300 yards | 301-500 yards | 501-1000 yards | 1000+ yards |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| White Winners | 11 | 7 | 2 | 0 | 1 | 1 |
| Black Winners | 3 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
| White Runners-Up | 6 | 2 | 3 | 0 | 1 | 0 |
| Black Runners-Up | 7 | 0 | 2 | 1 | 3 | 1 |
| White 3rd & 4th | 25 | 8 | 13 | 1 | 3 | 0 |
| Black 3rd & 4th | 5 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 4 | 0 |
The statistic that I find most surprising is that there have been more Black quarterbacks than White quarterbacks to finish second in the Heisman voting since 1986. White winners outnumber Black winners 11-3, yet Black runners-up outnumber White runners-up 7-6. By my count, 4 of the 7 Black runners-up should have won the award. A fifth runner-up, Joey Hamilton in 1999, finished ahead of another Black quarterback, Michael Vick, who should have been the rightful Heisman winner.
Five of those 7 runners-up rushed for more than yards than Charlie Ward did during his Heisman winning season. Four of them totaled more than 500 yards. At the same time, only 1 of the 6 White runners-up rushed for more than 500 yards. Among quarterbacks who finished third and fourth in the Heisman balloting, 84% of White quarterbacks rushed for less than 300 yards while 80% of Black quarterbacks rushed for more than 500. It’s as if the criteria for winning the Heisman and merely placing high in the voting are completely different for Black quarterbacks. I do not believe any of this is a coincidence. Black quarterbacks who want to win the Heisman Trophy have to be and play a certain way.
None of this is clandestine or subtle. We can go year by year and see how and when Black quarterbacks were kept out of the Heisman winners club. In fact, let me do that.
Because everything in college football changed drastically when the Bowl Championship Series (BCS) was implemented in 1998, I feel the need to examine the Heisman travesties in the pre BCS and BCS eras separately. In the years between 1986 and 1998, the biggest Heisman injustices occurred in 1987, 1990, 1992, and 1995. The most egregious Heisman decisions during the BCS era took place in 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, and—based solely on Heisman voting patterns—2007. Yes, I believe there have been ten horrendously awarded Heisman Trophies in the past 25 years. I’ll go through each one of them.
1987 Tim Brown of Notre Dame became the first wide receiver to win the Heisman. Don McPherson of Syracuse was the runner up. McPherson led the Orangemen to an undefeated season despite little offensive talent other than himself. Winning would have made McPherson the first Black quarterback to win the award. Brown’s victory has been criticized as the result of a Notre Dame bias.
1990 Ty Detmer won the award over Raghib Ismail and Eric Bienemy. At the time, many thought Rocket Ismail was robbed of the award, but his placing second was, in my opinion, another result of the Notre Dame bias. As the best player on the nation’s best team, I thought Bienemy should have been the winner during a season with no truly transcendent player. Yes, Detmer threw for over 5,000 yards, but no quarterback who throws 28 interceptions in a single season should ever win the Heisman Trophy.
1992 Gino Torretta won the award because he was the starting quarterback for a Miami Hurricanes team that was poised to complete a second consecutive undefeated national championship season. The truth, however, was that Torretta was the team’s weak link. Running backs Marshall Faulk of San Diego State and Garrison Hearst of Georgia were far and away the most deserving candidates that year.
1995 Eddie George of Ohio State was the 1995 winner. He had a very good season, but it was not great. George did nothing transcendent or memorable that year. Although he came close, he did not surpass the 2,000 yard mark. He had several 200 yard rushing days, but he did nothing truly special. Tommy Frazier, on the other hand, was the best player on what many experts still consider the best team in college football history. A legitimate argument can be made that Frazier is the best college quarterback of the past 30 years. The closest comparison I can make between him and a player from a different sport is Mark Messier. Entering, 1995, Frazier was already a two-time national championship game MVP. During that season, he led the most powerful, dominating, and devastating offense the sport has ever seen. Frazier’s not winning is a clear case of the voters not wanting to give the Heisman to a Black quarterback who was not considered a “real” quarterback.
The BCS brought in an era of guaranteeing that the #1 and #2 teams would meet for the national championship at the end of every season. Under the old bowl system, conference ties were the primary force behind teams’ bowl bids. There were many cases of top three teams in the polls playing in three different bowls. The BCS ended those days. With so much emphasis on the new true BCS National Championship Game, everything else was devalued. This affected the Heisman voters. Only 4 of the 11 Heisman winners in the years immediately prior to the BCS era played for a national championship. 8 of the 12 Heisman winners since have done so.
The first two Heisman winners of the BCS era, running backs Ricky Williams and Ron Dayne, won the award in 1998 and 1999, respectively, after seasons during which they set the all-time Division I-A career rushing record. Williams’ Texas team played in the Cotton Bowl; Dayne’s Wisconsin Badgers played in the Rose Bowl. Carson Palmer won the 2002 Heisman; his USC reached the Orange Bowl. In 2007, Tim Tebow won the trophy and played in the Capital One Bowl. Every other Heisman winner since 1998 played in the BCS National Championship Game that season. As such, it has become commonly accepted that the Heisman is now awarded to either the quarterback of the best team or record-breaking running back and no longer the best skill position player in the country. This, of course, has led to a large number of Heisman voting atrocities:
1998 With over 2,000 yards and 27 touchdowns, Ricky Williams had a great year running the ball for the Longhorns. What Michael Bishop did in Manhattan, Kansas, though, was legendary. Bishop threw 23 touchdowns against only 4 interceptions while running for 748 yards and 14 touchdowns while leading Kansas State to the only undefeated regular season in the program’s history. Only a double-overtime defeat kept the Wildcats from playing Tennessee for the first BCS National Championship. Williams’ winning the Heisman was more of a career award—he broke the career rushing record in the season finale—than for the 1998 season. He was not the most outstanding player in the country that year; he was only the second-best in his own conference.
1999 Like Ricky Williams did one season earlier, Ron Dayne won the Heisman on the strength of breaking the career rushing record during the season. Dayne’s 1999 season was not great. Joey Hamilton’s, on the other hand, was. In 1999, Hamilton completed two-thirds of his passes for over 3,000 yards, threw 29 touchdown passes, and ran for more than 700 yards. He was the runner-up. But even he was not the most outstanding player in the country. That was Michael Vick, who, as a freshman, led Virginia Tech to the brink of a national championship. Vick’s numbers don’t tell the whole story, but he was clearly the best player in the country. Everyone acknowledged as much. Yet he only finished third.
2000 Chris Weinke won because there was no obvious strong candidate and he was the best quarterback among the national championship contenders. Like Gino Torretta before him, Weinke was his team’s weak link. He was the biggest reason Florida State did not win a second consecutive championship that year. In my opinion, Drew Brees was the most deserving candidate. Brees led his Purdue team to the Rose Bowl, but the Boilermakers won a weak Big Ten. At no point were they ranked higher than 9th. This past generation has shown that a Heisman winner will not come from a team that bad.
2001 Eric Crouch may be the least deserving Heisman winner of my lifetime. We’ve already taken a look at his passing statistics. But he did run for more than 1,100 yards on the season. And he had a signature play during Nebraska’s upset of top-ranked Oklahoma when he caught a touchdown pass during a trick play. But his passing was a major liability for the Cornhuskers. This was proven in their season finale at Colorado when the Buffaloes jumped ahead early and Nebraska did not have the passing attack required to catch up. Colorado ended up winning 62-36. In the BCS National Championship Game, Miami made Crouch look like a junior varsity quarterback. I felt that Rex Grossman of Florida and Joey Harrington of Oregon were the most deserving candidates. The excuse given for voting against Grossman was that he was a sophomore and no underclassman had yet won the Heisman. Harrington did not win because of a well-publicized bias against players from the West Coast.
2002 All the talk leading up to the Heisman Trophy announcement was whether or not Carson Palmer was a legitimate candidate to win. That West Coast bias had prevented any player from west of the Rocky Mountains from winning the award since 1981. He wasn’t even considered among the favorites. Willis McGahee, Ken Dorsey, and Brad Banks were expected to finish first and second. I actually expected Penn State’s Larry Johnson to win. I know that McGahee and Dorsey would cancel each other and that Banks couldn’t win. But Palmer won. It stunned a lot of people. It should have annoyed people. Palmer’s season was nowhere near the same level as Banks’. Brad Banks controlled the Big Ten season in 2002. That Iowa team had no business competing in the conference, yet they went undefeated in the Big Ten. Palmer was the better pro prospect and outplayed Banks in the Orange Bowl, but Brad Banks was the best player during the regular season. The Heisman should have been his, but the so-called West Coast bias was broken.
2007 This was Tim Tebow’s Heisman year. How many Heisman taboos were broken with this one? They used to say that no underclassman could win the Heisman. Tebow became the first sophomore to win it. After Ricky Williams won the first Heisman Trophy of the BCS era, no player had won the award without playing in a BCS bowl. Tebow’s Florida team earned a trip to the Capital One Bowl. Tebow also became the first Heisman Trophy winner of the BCS era to play for a team that lost more than two regular season games. A big deal was made about Tebow becoming the first player in college football history to throw for 20 touchdowns and run for 20 touchdowns in the same season. That is a truly great achievement, and Tebow had a great year, but he did not deserve the Heisman. Dennis Dixon was the best player in the nation. But he got hurt in the first quarter of the tenth game of the season—Oregon went on to lose out for the remainder of the regular season—and a player who misses 25% of the season can’t win the award. Pat White also had a great season while leading West Virginia to the Big East championship. White’s numbers weren’t as gaudy as Tebow’s, but he won games. We always hear about how quarterbacks are judged by wins and losses, yet Tim Tebow won the Heisman Trophy during a season in which he led the defending national champions to a 9-3 record and finished 3rd in the SEC East. This man, who became the very first underclassman to win the award and was force fed down our throats as a representative of all that is right and good with this world, is the only Heisman winner of the past 11 years to not play in the BCS. You have to look all the way back to Tim Brown’s season in 1987 to find a Heisman winner to play on a team with as many losses as Tebow’s Florida Gators. How exactly did Tebow win the award? I’m not saying that he didn’t deserve to win it—I probably would have voted for him after Dixon was injured—but the voters had just spent the previous decade establishing criteria that Tebow did not meet.
What has occurred during the BCS era is that only four men have won the Heisman Trophy without playing on a team that played in the BCS National Championship Game. In each of those four seasons, a Black quarterback should have been the rightful winner of the trophy. But we see these things occur over and over every day of our lives. Certain rules apply until they don’t. Michael Vick can’t win the Heisman in 1999 because underclassmen don’t win, but Tim Tebow, Sam Bradford, and Mark Ingram can win as sophomores. There is a West Coast bias keeping players from winning the Heisman, but Carson Palmer can win despite playing one game on national television during a season in which his team was never a contender for the championship. The Heisman goes to the best player on the best team, but Tebow can win despite his team finishing third in its division within its conference. Option quarterbacks can’t win because they don’t throw the ball well enough, but Eric Crouch can win even though he threw more interceptions than touchdowns. Quarterbacks who turn the ball over can’t win, but Ty Detmer can win fairly comfortably while throwing 28 interceptions.
All this is why I fully expected the arrival of controversy regarding Cam Newton. Newton is by far the best player in the nation. He is nearly as obvious a choice for the Heisman as Barry Sanders was in 1988. There is no way to even fabricate an on-field argument for denying him the trophy, so off-field issues are the only way to stop him.
Cam Newton is exactly the kind of Black quarterback who has never been able to win the Heisman. To date, he has a four to one touchdown to interception ration while completing 67.9% of his passes. He has also rushed for greater than 1,300 yards so far. On top of that, he holds the Auburn records for passing touchdowns and rushing touchdowns in a season. He is on the verge of matching Tebow’s 2007 feat of throwing and rushing for 20 touchdowns in a season. And his team, despite a historically bad pass defense, is undefeated. Cam Newton is in the midst of the greatest season by a college quarterback in my lifetime. So, yeah, they were going to come after him. And even though the NCAA has ruled him eligible, some in the media are still coming after him.
How much of the Cam Newton drama is the result of jealous former suitors like Mississippi State and Florida watching him lead a rival to college football’s promised land? How much of this controversy is because people don’t want to see a guy who’s not a “real” quarterback win the Heisman Trophy? How much of this is just the natural occurrence in a sport that is most dominant in the most racially segregated and disharmonious areas of our country? How much of that is because Newton is widely viewed as the anti-Tebow? One year ago, people were making the argument that Tim Tebow was the greatest college football player ever. Now, we see that Tebow was not even the best quarterback in his own conference over the past five years.
And, finally, why hasn’t anyone looked at Cam Newton’s troubles over the past two months from this standpoint? He plays in the SEC, a conference that has only had one non-White head football coach in its history. These folks will be damned before they let a running Negro quarterback win the Heisman Trophy on their watch.
| Name | Year | Completions | Attempts | % | Yards | TDs | INTs | TD/INT Ratio |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cam Newton | 2010 | 148 | 218 | 67.89% | 2254 | 24 | 6 | 4.00 |
| Andrew Luck | 2010 | 245 | 349 | 70.20% | 3051 | 28 | 7 | 4.00 |
| Andy Dalton | 2010 | 194 | 293 | 66.21% | 2638 | 26 | 6 | 4.33 |
| Denard Robinson | 2010 | 155 | 250 | 62.00% | 2316 | 16 | 10 | 1.60 |
| Kellen Moore | 2010 | 221 | 311 | 71.06% | 3269 | 30 | 5 | 6.00 |
| Ryan Mallett | 2010 | 242 | 364 | 66.48% | 3592 | 30 | 11 | 2.73 |
| Terrell Pryor | 2010 | 196 | 298 | 65.77% | 2551 | 25 | 11 | 2.27 |
| Colt McCoy | 2009 | 332 | 470 | 70.64% | 3521 | 27 | 12 | 2.25 |
| Tim Tebow | 2009 | 213 | 314 | 67.83% | 2895 | 21 | 5 | 4.20 |
| Sam Bradford | 2008 | 328 | 483 | 67.91% | 4720 | 50 | 8 | 6.25 |
| Colt McCoy | 2008 | 332 | 433 | 76.67% | 3859 | 34 | 8 | 4.25 |
| Tim Tebow | 2008 | 192 | 298 | 64.43% | 2746 | 30 | 4 | 7.50 |
| Graham Harrell | 2008 | 442 | 626 | 70.61% | 5111 | 45 | 9 | 5.00 |
| Pat White | 2008 | 180 | 274 | 65.69% | 1842 | 21 | 7 | 3.00 |
| Tim Tebow | 2007 | 234 | 350 | 66.86% | 3286 | 32 | 6 | 5.33 |
| Colt Brennan | 2007 | 359 | 510 | 70.39% | 4343 | 38 | 17 | 2.24 |
| Chase Daniel | 2007 | 384 | 563 | 68.21% | 4306 | 33 | 11 | 3.00 |
| Dennis Dixon | 2007 | 172 | 254 | 67.72% | 2136 | 20 | 4 | 5.00 |
| Pat White | 2007 | 144 | 216 | 66.67% | 1724 | 14 | 4 | 3.50 |
| Troy Smith | 2006 | 203 | 311 | 65.27% | 2542 | 30 | 6 | 5.00 |
| Brady Quinn | 2006 | 289 | 467 | 61.88% | 3426 | 37 | 7 | 5.29 |
| Vince Young | 2005 | 212 | 325 | 65.23% | 3036 | 26 | 10 | 2.60 |
| Matt Leinart | 2005 | 283 | 431 | 65.66% | 3815 | 28 | 8 | 3.50 |
| Brady Quinn | 2005 | 292 | 450 | 64.89% | 3919 | 32 | 7 | 4.57 |
| Matt Leinart | 2004 | 269 | 412 | 65.29% | 3322 | 33 | 6 | 5.50 |
| Jason White | 2004 | 255 | 390 | 65.38% | 3205 | 35 | 9 | 3.89 |
| Alex Smith | 2004 | 214 | 317 | 67.51% | 2952 | 32 | 4 | 8.00 |
| Jason White | 2003 | 278 | 451 | 61.64% | 3846 | 40 | 10 | 4.00 |
| Eli Manning | 2003 | 275 | 441 | 62.36% | 3600 | 29 | 10 | 2.90 |
| Matt Leinart | 2003 | 255 | 402 | 63.43% | 3556 | 38 | 9 | 4.22 |
| Carson Palmer | 2002 | 309 | 489 | 63.19% | 3942 | 33 | 10 | 3.30 |
| Brad Banks | 2002 | 170 | 294 | 57.82% | 2573 | 26 | 5 | 5.20 |
| Ken Dorsey | 2002 | 222 | 393 | 56.49% | 3369 | 28 | 12 | 2.33 |
| Rex Grossman | 2002 | 287 | 503 | 57.06% | 3402 | 22 | 17 | 1.29 |
| Eric Crouch | 2001 | 105 | 189 | 55.56% | 1510 | 7 | 10 | 0.70 |
| Rex Grossman | 2001 | 259 | 395 | 65.57% | 3896 | 34 | 12 | 2.83 |
| Ken Dorsey | 2001 | 184 | 318 | 57.86% | 2652 | 23 | 9 | 2.56 |
| Joey Harrington | 2001 | 186 | 322 | 57.76% | 2415 | 23 | 5 | 4.60 |
| Chris Weinke | 2000 | 266 | 431 | 61.72% | 4167 | 33 | 11 | 3.00 |
| Josh Heupel | 2000 | 305 | 472 | 64.62% | 3606 | 20 | 15 | 1.33 |
| Drew Brees | 2000 | 309 | 512 | 60.35% | 3668 | 26 | 12 | 2.17 |
| Joey Hamilton | 1999 | 203 | 305 | 66.56% | 3060 | 29 | 11 | 2.64 |
| Michael Vick | 1999 | 90 | 152 | 59.21% | 1840 | 12 | 5 | 2.40 |
| Drew Brees | 1999 | 337 | 544 | 61.95% | 3909 | 25 | 12 | 2.08 |
| Michael Bishop | 1998 | 164 | 295 | 55.59% | 2844 | 23 | 4 | 5.75 |
| Cade McNown | 1998 | 207 | 357 | 57.98% | 3470 | 25 | 11 | 2.27 |
| Tim Couch | 1998 | 400 | 553 | 72.33% | 4275 | 36 | 15 | 2.40 |
| Donovan McNabb | 1998 | 157 | 251 | 62.55% | 2134 | 22 | 5 | 4.40 |
| Peyton Manning | 1997 | 287 | 477 | 60.17% | 3819 | 36 | 11 | 3.27 |
| Ryan Leaf | 1997 | 227 | 410 | 55.37% | 3968 | 34 | 11 | 3.09 |
| Danny Wuerfell | 1996 | 207 | 360 | 57.50% | 3625 | 39 | 13 | 3.00 |
| Jake Plummer | 1996 | 179 | 313 | 57.19% | 2575 | 24 | 9 | 2.67 |
| Tommy Frazier | 1995 | 92 | 163 | 56.44% | 1362 | 17 | 4 | 4.25 |
| Danny Wuerfell | 1995 | 210 | 325 | 64.62% | 3266 | 35 | 10 | 3.50 |
| Steve McNair | 1994 | 304 | 530 | 57.36% | 4863 | 44 | 17 | 2.59 |
| Kerry Collins | 1994 | 176 | 264 | 66.67% | 2679 | 21 | 7 | 3.00 |
| Kordell Stewart | 1994 | 147 | 237 | 62.03% | 2071 | 10 | 3 | 3.33 |
| Charlie Ward | 1993 | 264 | 380 | 69.47% | 3032 | 27 | 4 | 6.75 |
| Heath Shuler | 1993 | 184 | 285 | 64.56% | 2354 | 25 | 8 | 3.13 |
| Tommy Frazier | 1993 | 77 | 162 | 47.53% | 1159 | 12 | 4 | 3.00 |
| Gino Torretta | 1992 | 228 | 402 | 56.72% | 3060 | 19 | 7 | 2.71 |
| Casey Weldon | 1991 | 189 | 313 | 60.38% | 2527 | 22 | 8 | 2.75 |
| Ty Detmer | 1991 | 249 | 403 | 61.79% | 4031 | 35 | 12 | 2.92 |
| Ty Detmer | 1990 | 361 | 562 | 64.23% | 5188 | 41 | 28 | 1.46 |
| Shawn Moore | 1990 | 144 | 241 | 59.75% | 2262 | 21 | 8 | 2.63 |
| Darian Hagan | 1990 | 75 | 163 | 46.01% | 1538 | 11 | 8 | 1.38 |
| Andre Ware | 1989 | 365 | 578 | 63.15% | 4699 | 46 | 15 | 3.07 |
| Major Harris | 1989 | 142 | 245 | 57.96% | 2058 | 17 | 11 | 1.55 |
| Tony Rice | 1989 | 68 | 137 | 49.64% | 1122 | 2 | 9 | 0.22 |
| Darian Hagan | 1989 | 48 | 85 | 56.47% | 1002 | 4 | 4 | 1.00 |
| Rodney Peete | 1988 | 208 | 338 | 61.54% | 2654 | 18 | 10 | 1.80 |
| Troy Aikman | 1988 | 209 | 327 | 63.91% | 2599 | 23 | 8 | 2.88 |
| Steve Walsh | 1988 | 233 | 390 | 59.74% | 3115 | 29 | 12 | 2.42 |
| Major Harris | 1988 | 105 | 186 | 56.45% | 1915 | 14 | 8 | 1.75 |
| Tony Rice | 1988 | 70 | 138 | 50.72% | 1176 | 8 | 7 | 1.14 |
| Don McPherson | 1987 | 129 | 229 | 56.33% | 2341 | 22 | 11 | 2.00 |
| Jamelle Holieway | 1987 | 21 | 62 | 33.87% | 548 | 7 | 4 | 1.75 |
| Vinny Testaverde | 1986 | 175 | 276 | 63.41% | 2557 | 26 | 9 | 2.89 |
| Jim Harbaugh | 1986 | 180 | 277 | 64.98% | 2729 | 10 | 11 | 0.91 |
| Jamelle Holieway | 1986 | 32 | 66 | 48.48% | 588 | 6 | 4 | 1.50 |
| Name | Heisman Winner Position | Rushes | Yards | Average | TDs | Total TDs |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cam Newton | ? | 228 | 1336 | 5.86 | 18 | 42 |
| Andrew Luck | ? | 51 | 438 | 8.59 | 3 | 31 |
| Andy Dalton | ? | 77 | 407 | 5.29 | 5 | 31 |
| Denard Robinson | ? | 245 | 1643 | 6.71 | 14 | 30 |
| Kellen Moore | ? | 14 | -34 | -2.43 | 0 | 30 |
| Ryan Mallett | ? | 40 | -46 | -1.15 | 4 | 34 |
| Terrell Pryor | ? | 120 | 639 | 5.33 | 4 | 29 |
| Colt McCoy | Running Back | 129 | 348 | 2.70 | 3 | 30 |
| Tim Tebow | Running Back | 217 | 910 | 4.19 | 14 | 35 |
| Sam Bradford | Quarterback | 42 | 47 | 1.12 | 5 | 55 |
| Colt McCoy | Quarterback | 136 | 561 | 4.13 | 11 | 45 |
| Tim Tebow | Quarterback | 176 | 673 | 3.82 | 12 | 42 |
| Graham Harrell | Quarterback | 41 | -15 | -0.37 | 6 | 51 |
| Pat White | Quarterback | 191 | 974 | 5.10 | 8 | 29 |
| Tim Tebow | Quarterback | 210 | 895 | 4.26 | 23 | 55 |
| Colt Brennan | Quarterback | 82 | 27 | 0.33 | 8 | 46 |
| Chase Daniel | Quarterback | 109 | 253 | 2.32 | 4 | 37 |
| Dennis Dixon | Quarterback | 105 | 583 | 5.55 | 9 | 29 |
| Pat White | Quarterback | 197 | 1335 | 6.78 | 14 | 28 |
| Troy Smith | Quarterback | 72 | 204 | 2.83 | 1 | 31 |
| Brady Quinn | Quarterback | 82 | 71 | 0.87 | 2 | 39 |
| Vince Young | Running Back | 155 | 1050 | 6.77 | 12 | 38 |
| Matt Leinart | Running Back | 51 | 36 | 0.71 | 6 | 34 |
| Brady Quinn | Running Back | 70 | 90 | 1.29 | 1 | 33 |
| Matt Leinart | Quarterback | 49 | -44 | -0.90 | 3 | 36 |
| Jason White | Quarterback | 23 | -56 | -2.43 | 0 | 35 |
| Alex Smith | Quarterback | 135 | 631 | 4.67 | 10 | 42 |
| Jason White | Quarterback | 42 | -150 | -3.57 | 1 | 41 |
| Eli Manning | Quarterback | 48 | 28 | 0.58 | 3 | 32 |
| Matt Leinart | Quarterback | 32 | -62 | -1.94 | 0 | 38 |
| Carson Palmer | Quarterback | 50 | 122 | 2.44 | 4 | 37 |
| Brad Banks | Quarterback | 81 | 423 | 5.22 | 5 | 31 |
| Ken Dorsey | Quarterback | 23 | -48 | -2.09 | 0 | 28 |
| Rex Grossman | Quarterback | 58 | -65 | -1.12 | 1 | 23 |
| Eric Crouch | Quarterback | 203 | 1115 | 5.49 | 18 | 25 |
| Rex Grossman | Quarterback | 34 | 8 | 0.24 | 5 | 39 |
| Ken Dorsey | Quarterback | 12 | 3 | 0.25 | 0 | 23 |
| Joey Harrington | Quarterback | 55 | 56 | 1.02 | 7 | 30 |
| Chris Weinke | Quarterback | 30 | -97 | -3.23 | 1 | 34 |
| Josh Heupel | Quarterback | 70 | 144 | 2.06 | 7 | 27 |
| Drew Brees | Quarterback | 95 | 521 | 5.48 | 5 | 31 |
| Joey Hamilton | Running Back | 154 | 734 | 4.77 | 6 | 35 |
| Michael Vick | Running Back | 108 | 585 | 5.42 | 8 | 20 |
| Drew Brees | Running Back | 79 | 177 | 2.24 | 4 | 29 |
| Michael Bishop | Running Back | 177 | 748 | 4.23 | 14 | 37 |
| Cade McNown | Running Back | 75 | 182 | 2.43 | 3 | 28 |
| Tim Couch | Running Back | 64 | -124 | -1.94 | 1 | 37 |
| Donovan McNabb | Running Back | 135 | 438 | 3.24 | 8 | 30 |
| Peyton Manning | Cornerback | 49 | -30 | -0.61 | 3 | 39 |
| Ryan Leaf | Cornerback | 82 | -48 | -0.59 | 6 | 40 |
| Danny Wuerfell | Quarterback | 63 | -100 | -1.59 | 2 | 41 |
| Jake Plummer | Quarterback | 85 | 63 | 0.74 | 3 | 27 |
| Tommy Frazier | Running Back | 97 | 604 | 6.23 | 14 | 31 |
| Danny Wuerfell | Running Back | 46 | -141 | -3.07 | 2 | 37 |
| Steve McNair | Running Back | 119 | 936 | 7.87 | 9 | 53 |
| Kerry Collins | Running Back | 12 | -19 | -1.58 | 0 | 21 |
| Kordell Stewart | Running Back | 122 | 639 | 5.24 | 7 | 17 |
| Charlie Ward | Quarterback | 65 | 339 | 5.22 | 4 | 31 |
| Heath Shuler | Quarterback | 46 | 73 | 1.59 | 3 | 28 |
| Tommy Frazier | Quarterback | 126 | 704 | 5.59 | 9 | 21 |
| Gino Torretta | Quarterback | 34 | -24 | -0.71 | 0 | 19 |
| Casey Weldon | Wide Receiver | 38 | -30 | -0.79 | 0 | 22 |
| Ty Detmer | Wide Receiver | 75 | -30 | -0.40 | 0 | 35 |
| Ty Detmer | Quarterback | 73 | -166 | -2.27 | 0 | 41 |
| Shawn Moore | Quarterback | N/A | 303 | N/A | 8 | 29 |
| Darian Hagan | Quarterback | 138 | 442 | 3.20 | 5 | 16 |
| Andre Ware | Quarterback | 50 | -38 | -0.76 | 0 | 46 |
| Major Harris | Quarterback | 155 | 936 | 6.04 | 6 | 23 |
| Tony Rice | Quarterback | 174 | 884 | 5.08 | 7 | 9 |
| Darian Hagan | Quarterback | 186 | 1132 | 6.09 | 17 | 21 |
| Rodney Peete | Running Back | 68 | 68 | 1.00 | 5 | 23 |
| Troy Aikman | Running Back | 78 | 83 | 1.06 | 1 | 24 |
| Steve Walsh | Running Back | 15 | -33 | -2.20 | 0 | 29 |
| Major Harris | Running Back | 134 | 610 | 4.55 | 6 | 20 |
| Tony Rice | Running Back | 121 | 700 | 5.79 | 9 | 17 |
| Don McPherson | Wide Receiver | 110 | 199 | 1.81 | 5 | 27 |
| Jamelle Holieway | Wide Receiver | 142 | 860 | 6.06 | 10 | 17 |
| Vinny Testaverde | Quarterback | 46 | -103 | -2.24 | 4 | 30 |
| Jim Harbaugh | Quarterback | 94 | 118 | 1.26 | 8 | 18 |
| Jamelle Holieway | Quarterback | 146 | 807 | 5.53 | 10 | 16 |
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