Blue Workhorse is gathering votes for their second annual Sports Blog Heisman Trophy Winner. I happy that this is my first year because the field is so thin at quarterback, way more fun ot pick when the other 21 guys are considered.
The two leading Quarterback candidates had awful championship games (Tebow cost his team a championship and McCoy damn near cost his team their championship) and that opened it up.
So what are the things I consider a positive?
- Team has had marginal success (a top 30 team and in contention for their conference title)
- Team has had some marquee victories over ranked opponents
- The player has been the main reason for their success.
1) Ndamukong Suh. It was really hard to pick between Suh and Dion Lewis (my number 2) but by playing his best game of the year and knocking Colt McCoy down a peg last week get Suh the nod.Some of the Huskers most impressive wins were marked by stout defense. Keeping a ranked opponent to 3 points (Oklahoma) may not be as sexy as dropping 50+ but, in my opinion, it is a far greater feat to accomplish.
His raw stats are amazing even if you put aside 82 tackles, 12 quarterback sacks, and 22 tackles for loss you are still looking at someone with 24 quarterback hurries, 10 pass breakups, three blocked kicks, and one interception.
Finally Suh had his best game at the most important moment of the season. When he had 4.5 sacks, six tackles for loss, against Texas.
2) Dion Lewis: Lewis had fewer than 20 carries only twice this season, 19 against NC State and 18 against Syracuse. For a freshman running back to rank third in the nation in total yards and to never turn the ball over is nearly unheard of. He actually managed to force a fumble when someone else did it. (A running back 3rd in the nation in yardage with hudreds of carries and a +1 turnover ratio)
Against Cincinnati he single handily kept Pitt in the game until the bitter end. Despite the loss his 47 carries for nearly two hundred yards and three touchdowns stands out as just about the biggest game, by anyone, last week. To think that he still has three more years to play has to be seriously frightening for other teams in the Big East.
3) Kellen Moore: I know a lot of folks are going to knock the level of competition that Moore faced but a 13:1 Touchdown to interception ratio is solid no matter what the competition level is. In my opinion he has shown a better pocket presence than Tim Tebow or Colt McCoy and without him the Bronco's would not be busting into the BCS this season.
Moore had three five touchdown games this season, including a key game against Nevada which clinched the WAC conference.