A&M’s Sumlin Says “Compare The Numbers” When Pushing Manziel For Heisman

November 21st, 2012 01:30 PM║ Posted By: John Pennington ║ Permalink ║ Schools: Alabama, Auburn, Florida, Texas A&M
Tags: Heisman Trophy, Johnny Manziel, QB, Total Offense

Here’s a quick and easy way to end most arguments: Do the math. And that happens to be the view of Texas A&M coach Kevin Sumlin when it comes to the Heisman Trophy campaign of redshirt freshman quarterback Johnny Manziel:

“Compare his numbers to anyone who’s played the game — they speak for themselves.”

Okay, let’s check him against the last five Heisman winners.

Season	Player	School	Position	Total Offense	Touchdowns
2007	Tim Tebow	Florida	QB (13 games)	4,181 yards	55
2008	Sam Bradford	Oklahoma	QB (14 games)	4,767 yards	55
2009	Mark Ingram	Alabama	RB (14 games)	1,992 yards	20
2010	Cam Newton	Auburn	QB (14 games)	4,327 yards	51
2011	Robert Griffin III	Baylor	QB (13 games)	4,992 yards	47
2012	Johnny Manziel	Texas A&M	QB (11 games)	4,161 yards	38

Now let’s compare Manziel to this season’s top five total offense leaders.

Rank	Player	School	Position	Total Offense	Touchdowns
1	Johnny Manziel	Texas A&M	QB (11 games)	4,161 yards	38
2	Jordan Lynch	N. Illinois	QB (11 games)	4,086 yards	38
3	Rakeem Cato	Marshall	QB (11 games)	3,913 yards	33
4	Colby Cameron	Louisiana Tech	QB (11 games)	3,861 yards	31
5	Nick Florence	Baylor	QB (10 games)	3,838 yards	34
6	Tajh Boyd	Clemson	QB (11 games)	3,833 yards	41

For the record, this writer doesn’t care much for the Heisman Trophy because there is no official criteria used to determine the winner. One year voters will base their decision on stats — and that would certainly aid Manziel this season — while another year they’ll vote for the best player on the best team. Only one defensive player has ever won the award (Michigan’s Charles Woodson) but his all-purpose numbers were trumped by another defensive back just a couple of years later (Georgia’s Champ Bailey) and that player didn’t even sniff the Heisman. So in our book, it’s the most over-hyped award in a sport filled with over-hyped awards.

But if you go by the numbers, Sumlin’s right. If the Heisman is going to go to the guy with the best stats this year, the winner should be Manziel.

« Report: Hogs Reach Out To Dores’ Franklin

UF’s Muschamp: Driskel To Start Versus FSU »

1 comments

Sort: Newest | Oldest

alamoaggie08

by definition, the award is supposed to go to the most outstanding player in college football. voters' perspectives on what that exactly is vary each year, but by that definition if you had to submit a vote for this year's heisman winner, who would it be?

This entry was posted on Wednesday, November 21st, 2012 at 1:30 pm and is filed under Homepage . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.