Heisman Retrospective

Nice of Billy Sims to scream “Boomer” a dozen times like a crazy person, even making the winning QB from Oklahoma a little uncomfortable

Besides Oklahoma QB Sam Bradford winning the Heisman Saturday night, we learned two very important pieces of information.

First, we learned that Florida is going to beat Oklahoma. The Heisman curse is real, and on top of not having experience playing in the NC like Tebow has, Bradford has to deal with fate. The last four non-USC Heisman QB’s have all lost their bowl games. Tebow lost the Capital One Bowl last year. Troy Smith lost the BCS championship in 2006. Jason White lost the ‘03 Sugar Bowl. Eric Crouch lost the ‘01 Rose Bowl. And now Sam Bradford is going to lose in the ‘08 championship game.

We also learned that there was a really, really good reason why the Heisman folks didn’t invite Texas Tech QB Graham Harrell. It turns out Harrell only got 4% of the total points compared with 3rd place finisher Tebow who had 29.3%. Harrell was far closer to 5th place Michael Crabtree at 2.2% than Tebow, and even if Crabtree and Harrell combined their points for some Red Raider pirate magic, they would have still only been at 6.2%.

How the votes came down for the top three was a bit surprising as well. Voters were split on Tebow giving him the most 1st place votes as well as the most 3rd place votes. Bradford got it done with a close margin in 1st place votes and an overwhelming lead on Tebow in 2nd place votes and three percentage points better on the same over baby Colt McCoy.

The results also present a fascinating scenario whereby, should Bradford and Tebow return next year, and McCoy returns as promised, the top three vote-getters will be back and the odds of another Archie Griffen double (mathematically at least, probably greater statistically). Also interesting will be that Bradford looks like he’ll actually be a good pro QB, which certainly hasn’t been the case historically.

You’re welcome.