My Heisman Ballot

Shotgun Spratling at The Blue Workhorse has put together the "2008 Sports Blog Heisman Trophy Winner" to be revealed on Thursday. Here's my ballot:

1) Tim Tebow - I tried to not make this pick so I wouldn't come off like an SEC Homer, but after watching Tebow put the Gators on his shoulders in the 4th quarter of the SEC Championship Game, I don't know how you don't vote him #1. He doesn't have the gaudy TD numbers that Bradford and McCoy (and Harrel and Daniel and Reesing) have, but he actually faced a real defense occasionally. The way the Gators have performed since their week 5 loss to Ole Miss has been nothing short of remarkable, and Tebow is the engine that makes them go.

2) Colt McCoy - The trophy was his to lose for the majority of the early season. He completed less than 60% of his passes just once this season - the 'Horns lone loss this season to Texas Tech. For the season he completed 77.6% of his passes for 32 TDs and 7 INTs. He tailed off a bit towards the end of the season, but he beat Bradford head to head, so he gets the 2nd place vote.

3) Sam Bradford - The offensive numbers speak for themselves. He's got a 48/6 TD/INT ratio and the Sooners have scored 60+ points in 5 straight games. He's got two things working against him as far as I can tell. First, OU lost straight up to Texas on a neutral field. Secondly, the whole Sooner team is unbelievable. You could plug another QB under center at OU a lot easier than you could at Texas or Florida. Tebow especially is irreplaceable.

A little bit of everything

Fox Sports has 20 burning questions about the 2008 college football season, including a few involving the SEC.

#5- Which teams will be the most disappointing?
Alabama- not quite there yet, but the fans are getting impatient. It takes time to build a great team.

I can’t imagine this will be the case anywhere outside of Tuscaloosa. I know the Tide won the recruiting national championship (and have the shirts to prove it), but few outside the Tide Nation really expect a whole lot out of that team this year. They’re certainly headed in the right direction under Saban, but they finished 7-6 and won the Indy Bowl last year. What expectations do they have that they’ll be so disappointed this year?

#6- Which BCS teams will be the sleepers this year?
SEC- Mississippi State

I think the Bulldogs will be closer to disappointing than the Tide will be. MSU is coming off an 8-win season and a bowl win. Seeing as how they were (quite possibly) the worst 8-win SEC team in history last season, their luck will most likely run out this season. Their abysmal offense was just that in their 6-0 (in OT) spring game. They get Vandy and Kentucky at home in conference, but no way they approach last year’s success.

8- Which BCS conference will prove to be the strongest?
yada...yada...yada...But this year looks like it will be the year of the Big 12.
The SEC will drop off a little bit this year. Kentucky doesn't have 'Dre, Tenn. doesn't have Ainge, Vandy is Vandy, Mississippi State is very mediocre, Mississippi and Arkansas have new coaches, Alabama has had strong recruiting classes, but still isn't there yet and South Carolina has so many question marks, you pretty much have to peg them as a .500 team. Auburn, Florida, Georgia and LSU are the big dawgs. The rest are puppies.

She’s right and wrong here. I’ll give her that Kentucky will be worse this year, MSU is mediocre and that Vandy is Vandy. I think the Hogs will struggle this year rebuilding under Petrino. But that’s where our agreement stops. Why is Tennessee disqualified because Ainge is gone? No way they win the East again this year, but the Vols are hardly a “puppy” as she claims.

Alabama will most likely improve over last season and they suffered a few painfully close losses. Ole Miss has a chance to be one of the most improved teams in the country under Houston Nutt. South Carolina was one of the top teams in the country before they suffered a collapse for the record books.

Sure, the SEC will be weaker than last year. Kentucky and Mississippi State won’t make bowl games this year after notching bowl wins last year, but Ole Miss and South Carolina could replace them if the cards fall right. I don’t think the SEC is ready to pass that torch off just yet..

12- Which new first year coach will have the most success?
You have to go with Bobby Petrino. …if the Hogs come out of this season with a winning record, then that will have been a huge success.

I guess that depends on your definition of the word success. If Petrino guides Arkansas to a 7-5 record and Houston Nutt does the same thing for Ole Miss, who’s had more success? My guess is that – at season’s end - Rebel fans are happier with Nutt than Hog fans are with Petrino.

20- Who will win the Heisman?
Tim Tebow of Florida is the obvious front-runner. But there are some others who will make a strong case; RB Noel Devine of West Virginia, QB Pat White of West Virginia, QB Chase Daniel of Mizzou, RB Beanie Wells of OSU, QB Sam Bradford of Oklahoma, RB Knowshon Moreno of Georgia, WR Michael Crabtree of Texas Tech, U Jeremy Maclin of Mizzou, QB Max Hall of BYU, and RB Joe McKnight of USC. Sleepers: PJ Hill of Wisconsin, WR/RB Percy Harvin of Florida and QB Colt McCoy of Texas.
My three way-too-early early picks are Knowshon Moreno (Georgia), Sam Bradford (Oklahoma) and Chase Daniel (Mizzou)

Of course Tebow is the frontrunner. How could he not be with a collection of YouTube videos like he has?

As usual it’s a wide open race. Look for tOSU’s Chris Wells to get a lot of pub down the stretch as the Buckeyes roll through the directional school equivalents in the Big10+1. You can count on Homer Herbie to begin the season long fawning in July or August, whenever he and Corso start getting their worthless mugs on TV on a daily basis.

19- Can LSU repeat?
Heck yeah! A few things have to happen, but the odds are good they can repeat. If Miles can get his QB situation under control, then this could be a special year for the Tigers. Their schedule is what dreams are made of. They play eight games at home, and four on the road, including at Auburn, at Florida and at Arkansas to close out their campaign. If they don't slip up at South Carolina and beat Georgia in Death Valley, they have a solid shot at being undefeated. The Georgia game is the big question mark in terms of them being undefeated, but they can still win the division crown since Georgia is in the SEC East, and LSU is in the West. Playing in any BCS bowl is not an unrealistic expectation for the defending champs, and neither is getting to the Big Dance.

The Tigers certainly have as good a shot as anyone. Their non-conference schedule is a joke, so no worries there. No way they survive undefeated, but if they have just 1 loss and win the SEC Championship Game, no way they don’t deserve a hot to defend their title. Of course, that’ll all depend on QB play and whether or not Perilloux is even on the team this August...

Heisman Finalists announced

The Heisman finalists were announced today with Florida QB Tim Tebow, Arkansas RB Darren McFadden, Missouri QB Colt Brennan, and Hawai'i QB Colt Brennan earning free trips to the Big Apple. This is the most wide open race in years and no one's really sure who's going to take it home.

Here's my guess how it's going to shape up this weekend...

4) Chase Daniel - He was incredible this season, leading the upstart Tigers to a late-season #1 ranking and just one win away from a berth in the BCS Championship game. While he has the numbers and success to win the trophy, I don't think he has the prerequisite preseason hype or the household name recognition that the other 3 candidates do.

3) Colt Brennan - He put up ridiculous numbers this season- again - and has set close to 40 records throughout his career. His competition level is the by far the weakest of the four finalists, but he's the only one playing in a BCS Bowl. Another strike against him is the simple fact that Island time is a whopping 6 hours behind EST and a lot of voters never got to see him play a full game. I just can't see him taking it home.

2)Darren McFadden - Yes, his numbers are better than last year. Yes, he's a junior and Tebow's only a sophomore. Yes, he had the hype in the preseason as well as the credentials from last year. Most years, he'd walk away with the trophy in a landslide, but he just hasn't had the consistency this year that Tebow has. If you take away his ridiculous game against South Carolina where he rushed for 321 yards, his numbers are actually a little behind last year's pace and Tebow's numbers are better than Troy Smith's, last year's winner.

1) Tim Tebow - If you throw out class and go strictly on body of work this season, this is definitely Tebow's Heisman to lose. He threw for 29 TDs and ran for 22 more. That should be enough to win it right there, but he also had a 177.85 QB rating and anchored one of the highest scoring offenses in the country. Shame on any voter who penalizes him for "only" being a sophomore.