Just as Monty Python had the Ministry of Silly Walks, sports ought to have a Ministry of Ludicrous Justifications.
It takes a clean, built-in, well-insulated, shockproof crap dectector to be a college football fan, especially when lazy-minded writers toss around premises like, “Marcus Mariota would have been a Heisman Trophy finalist if the Ducks didn’t have so many blowout wins.”
Well yeah, and if Marcus’s mother would have been an alligator, he’d be in a museum in Florida.
Photo left: The original dual-threat Florida Gator was no match for Tim Tebow, or Marcus Mariota.
You can’t merely massage the numbers to create a Heisman candidacy. A Heisman winner needs real, verifiable production rather than projections based on his touchdowns per pass or yards per play. To win the trophy, experts like The Heisman Pundit’s Chris Huston say, a player has to be on a winning team, star in big games on TV, be likable and accumulate stats. The numbers get voters’ attention, and they have to approach statistical benchmarks for the player’s position. 2000 yards for a running back, for example. Huston notes that:
The four Heisman-winning qbs since 2007 have averaged 4,566 yards of total offense and 52 tds.
Here are the last five, broken down:
2012 Johnny Manziel 3706 yards passing, 1409 yards rushing, 47 total tds ( team record: 11-2, 5th)
2011 Robert Griffin III 4293 yards passing, 699 yards rushing, 47 total tds (team 10-3, 13th)
2010 Cam Newton 2854 yards passing, 1473 yards rushing, 51 total tds (team 14-0, national champs)
2008 Sam Bradford 4720 yards passing, -18 yards rushing, 50 total tds (team 12-2, 4th)
2007 Tim Tebow 3286 yards passing, 895 yards rushing, 53 total tds (team 9-4, 13th)
2013 Marcus Mariota 2677 yards passing, 752 yards rushing, 38 total tds (team 12-1, 2nd)
Mariota’s numbers were wonderful for a redshirt freshmen. But they don’t approach those trip-to-the-Big-Apple levels of the other quarterbacks on this list. Still, offensive coordinator Scott Frost told ESPN’s Ted Miller that, “We wouldn’t trade him for anybody.” Frost told ESPN’s Ivan Maisel::
If I could throw like him, I wouldn’t be sitting here. The kid can make every single throw that he needs to make on the football field and makes it look easy. And he’s 6-4 and runs a 4.4. There’s just not that many guys like that.
The Ducks are certain to feature Mariota more in 2013. Frost said they’d be foolish not to, and with running backs Kenjon Barner and LaMichael James both in the NFL now, it’d be natural for the Webfoots to throw more, particularly with two former quarterbacks, Helfrich and Frost, in charge of the operation.
This off season they hired Duke assistant Matt Lubick as passing game coordinator/receivers coach. Lubick’s 2012 Blue Devil squad was the only FBS school in the country to have 3 receivers catch at least 60 passes. Altogether they threw for 3691 yards last season, with wideouts Jamison Crowder and Conner Vernon each churning out 1074 yards receiving, pacing the storied basketball school to a football bowl game for the first time in forever. Lubick won Wide Receivers Coach of the Year from footballscoop.com.
His work was evident in the spring game. The Duck wideouts showed off improved technique and route-running skills, hauling in passes all over the field, for 577 yards and 6 touchdowns, albeit against a shorthanded and inexperienced secondary. Still, the improvement in fundamentals bodes well for the passing attack, which figures to replace some of the yards and points the Ducks are missing with Barner, and James before him, taking their talents to The League.
As fans, you’d want Mariota to win the Heisman. The Trophy is another benchmark of reaching the top rung of football, and something the Ducks have never had. Even the Beavers have a Heisman Trophy winner, Terry Baker in 1963. He was a bust in the pros though, and Mariota seems more likely to duplicate the success of Newton, Griffin lll, Russell Wilson and Colin Kaepernick, the new wave of dual-threat qbs that are currently terrorizing the NFL.
Winning a Heisman makes it a lot easier for a school to win another one, and easier to recruit the next guy who can. The bulk of them have been won by high-profile players from marquee schools, and breaking through from a top five program with an exciting offense to a national championship winner with a bronze Jay Berwanger in the trophy case is the next rung of success for the Ducks. A Heisman completes the quest the Oregon brand set out on when they put the billboard of Joey Harrington in Times Square. It doesn’t take a village to win the Downtown Athletic Club’s trophy, but it does take image, notoriety, and the results to back up the hype.
It also takes a little bit of luck. Think of Doug Flutie, heaving a Hail Mary to beat Miami in 1984, or Manziel scrambling around madly, dropping the football, having it bounce straight back to him, and throwing a strike to a wide-open receiver in the end zone against Alabama. You can’t script those Heisman moments, those signature plays where an athlete’s talent and reaction time and poise meet the perfect situation, a play that everyone remembers and leads Sports Center, becomes a Youtube video with two million hits. Plays like that stick in the voters’ minds, and Heisman balloteers are only slightly less finicky than the New Hampshire electorate, slightly more forgiving than the voters for the Baseball Hall of Fame.
The race is wide open this season. Johnny Football’s offseason travels and travails, his brushes with fame, Twitter, parking tickets and high living make it far less likely he’ll repeat as a Heisman winner, something that’s only happened once in the history of the award anyway (Archie Griffin in 1974 and ’75). Official ballots are cast by prominent sports writers and past winners, and perception plays a big part. They jealously guard the history and image of the trophy, among the most coveted in sports.
Every quarterback, from Mariota to David Klingler to Doug Flutie to Scott Frost, is a product of three things: his talent and ability, the players around him, and his team’s style of play. Klingler, now a Biblical Studies professor at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, threw for 5140 yards and 54 touchdowns at Houston in 1990. Frost threw for 2677 yards and 18 tds in his career at Nebraska, but his team went 24-2 pounding the ball behind a mammoth offensive line, winning at National Championship in 1997, when Mariota was just four years old.
Neither Klingler and Frost won a Heisman, losing out to Ty Detmer and Charles Woodson respectively. Klingler’s stats were discounted because voters saw him as a system quarterback, throwing on every down, while Frost, like Mariota, functioned as a triggerman in a potent offense with a lot of weapons. His quarterback stats were modest, though Frost was only the 10th player in college football history to rush for over 1,000 yards and pass for 1,000 (1,095 rushing, 1,237 passing). It’s doubtful the Ducks offensive coordinator and their quarterback talk much about individual recognition, but if they do one point is probably foremost: which would you rather have, the Stiff Arm Trophy, or a National Championship ring? Easy choice for a soft-spoken, modest kid from Hawaii.
The Ducks will do whatever it takes to win in 2013. They’ll run or pass based on what the defense gives them. They won’t campaign for a Heisman or pad Super Mario’s numbers. They won’t have to. Based on his talent, the improvement in the wide receiver corps, and the season Oregon is likely to have, Mariota will exceed even the astronomical expectations fans have for him.
He’ll play only two or three quarters in at least half of UO’s games, but he’ll be so crisp and efficient when he plays that his award credentials will be undeniable. In a three-game stretch late last season, against Colorado, USC and Cal, Mariota threw for 12 touchdowns and no interceptions, with a combined passing rating of over 230. That’s what he’s capable of, and the cool, unflappable Samoan with the 4.4 speed isn’t bothered by hype, expectations or pressure.
As a first-year starter and redshirt freshman in 2012, he got dramatically better as the season progressed. In games 1-5, against the weakest part of the schedule, Marcus threw 11 touchdowns and 4 interceptions. In the season’s last 8 games, against the toughest part of the schedule, he threw 21 tds with just 2 interceptions. He also had runs of 86, 58, 77, 42 and 32 yards, all in the last 7 games.
His passer rating of 163.2 was the second highest in school history, behind Akili Smith’s 167.3 in 1998. His completion %, 68.5, ranked second all-time behind Nate Costa in 2010.
Oregon quarterbacks have been prolific in the spread offense, but none were better suited for it or more effective than MM was a freshman. And in 2013, he’ll be the confident leader rather than a role player. You could see the command and poise grow over the course of last year, and he looked even more comfortable running four efficient drives in the spring game. It was evident in his body language, his on-field demeanor, the way he went through his progressions, the way he interacted with his teammates. This is his team now, and he’s won the full confidence and respect of them. In a post-scrimmage interview running back Byron Marshall called him, “The best quarterback in college football.” They all believe it, and Mariota has the maturity and foundation in life not to waste a single second worrying about it; he’s too focused on doing his job and getting better.
It’s going to be a season for the ages. Confident and in command, Mariota will assault the Oregon record book as a sophomore, and devour the Hawaiian Time full meal deal:
The Heisman, the National Championship, and the #1 pick in the NFL draft. With a side order of fried spam.
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