Congratulations to USC phenom Reggie Bush, recognized tonight for being precisely what he is: the Most Outstanding Player in College Football.
Bush’s victory is the biggest in Heisman history. According to StiffArmTrophy.com, there are a maximum of 2,769 Heisman points available to a single player, if all 923 eligible voters cast ballots. Bush needed just 2,361 points to break Ricky Williams’s record for the biggest Heisman victory of all time. He got 2,541. That’s a whopping 91.8% of the maximum possible! (Williams got 85.2%, Charlie Ward got 83.5% and O.J. Simpson got 80.6%.)
LATER: Here is the final tally including all ten players receiving votes:
| Player | 1st | 2nd | 3rd | Total |
| Reggie Bush, Southern Cal | 784 | 89 | 11 | 2541 |
| Vince Young, Texas | 79 | 613 | 145 | 1608 |
| Matt Leinart, Southern Cal | 18 | 147 | 449 | 797 |
| Brady Quinn, Notre Dame | 7 | 21 | 128 | 191 |
| Michael Robinson, Penn St. | 2 | 7 | 29 | 49 |
| A.J. Hawk, Ohio State | 0 | 3 | 23 | 29 |
| DeAngelo Williams, Memphis | 1 | 2 | 19 | 26 |
| Drew Olson, UCLA | 1 | 2 | 14 | 21 |
| Jerome Harrison, Wash St. | 0 | 4 | 12 | 20 |
| Elvis Dumervil, Louisville | 0 | 0 | 9 | 9 |
| TOTAL | 892 | 888 | 839 | 5291 |
UPDATE: Here’s the AP article.
INSTALANCHE!: Welcome, InstaPundit readers! You might remember me as the “Katrina guy,” but as you can see, I like sports too… and lots of other stuff, to boot. Feel free to look around. And for more Heisman coverage (and coverage of USC’s football team generally), don’t miss original-content bloggers Alexis Jones and Nathan Gotsch at InsideUSC.com. They’re live from New York, it’s Saturday night, and I expect there will be lots of updates, photos, interviews, stories, etc., from the Heisman Trophy ceremony, in the next few hours.
UPDATE 2: ESPN is saying that Bush had “the second-most first-place votes ever, behind only O.J. Simpson.” But that’s stupid, because when O.J. won, there were 1,200 eligible voters; now, there are only 923! (See here.) It’s completely ridiculous to compare raw vote totals when the number of eligible voters has changed so drastically. If you look at the percentages, Bush got first-place votes from 79.8% of all eligible voters, whereas O.J., with 855 first-place votes, was picked by 71.3% of all eligible voters — substantially less than Bush.
UPDATE 3: If we look at the numbers of votes actually cast, rather than the size of the eligible voting population, Bush still beats O.J., though somewhat more narrowly (owing to higher turnout this year than in 1968). According to this, there were 995 voters who actually cast ballots in 1968. Of those, 85.9% had O.J. first. This year, 892 voters actually voted; 87.9% had Bush first.
UPDATE 4: In addition to being first on 784 of 892 ballots, Bush was either second or third on an additional 100 ballots, leaving only 8 ballots — 0.9% — from which he was left off entirely. Appearing on 99.1% of all ballots is yet another all-time record. (Hat tip: Jay.)
However, one record Bush did not set is largest margin of victory, even if you calculate it by percentage. That’s because, while Bush was the strongest-ever winner, Vince Young was also a very strong second-place candidate. In fact, Young received the highest percentage of second-place votes in history, according to ESPN. (And Leinart received the highest percentage of third-place votes ever. This confirms what analysts were saying about “lock-step voting.”) So whereas O.J. Simpson trampled Leroy Keyes of Purdue by a point total equal to 33.0% percent of the vote, Bush beat Young by “only” 17.6% percent — a healthy margin, to be sure, but nowhere near O.J.’s margin. This is a reflection not on Bush, but on the strength of Young’s candidacy, in spite of the Bush juggernaut.
Anyway… congrats to all the candidates on excellent seasons… but especially, congratulations again to Reggie Bush, probably the best football player I will ever have the privilege of seeing in person. And congrats to Pete Carroll and the Trojans… three Heismans in four years. Wow. FIGHT ON!!!
P.S. When Carson Palmer won the Heisman in 2002, I was in New York City, liveblogging (1, 2, 3, 4) from outside the Yale Club (and from ESPN Zone down the street, during the actual announcement). Photos here and here; blog wrap-up here; later pic of Palmer with Heisman here.
Last year, my coverge of Matt Leinart winning the Heisman included this observation:
Teams with the most Heisman Trophy winners in history:Notre Dame 7
USC 6
Ohio State 6
Oklahoma 4Reggie Bush ought to move the Trojans into a tie with the Irish next year…
I’m good. :)
Incidentally, that post was sandwiched between two posts about Charlie Weis being hired by the Irish — an event whose anniversary is tomorrow (Sunday).
|
Categories: Uncategorized
|
December 10th, 2005 at 9:39:00 pm
Wow, poor Brady Quinn. A mouse among men.
I wonder if his seven first place votes come from Notre Dame’s previous Heisman Trophey winners…if they’re still alive.
December 10th, 2005 at 9:47:17 pm
At least one–Paul Hornung said that he voted Quinn #1
December 10th, 2005 at 9:50:57 pm
Gee, I see you’re really trying to make friends with the resident Domers, Becky… heh. :)
December 10th, 2005 at 9:52:52 pm
No reason why it would be close.
Vince Young looked very ordinary in some games, expecially against Texas A&M.
Matt Leinhart was sub-par aginst ULCA.
The final vote was a confirmation of the obvious.
Congratulations Reggie Bush - And come back for your Senior year.
December 10th, 2005 at 9:53:03 pm
P.S. I, for one, will be rooting for Brady to get it next year, unless there is a Trojan in the running (LenDale White?). In fact, at the bookstore this evening, I bought a ND t-shirt styled after the green jersey with Quinn’s number on it (and a Fiesta Bowl logo near the left shoulder … doesn’t say “Fiesta Bowl 2006,” though, so it can just as easily apply to rooting for ND to get to the title game next year… again, so long as that doesn’t involve a conflict with USC… hey, they could lose in November and still get back to #2 in the BCS… :)
December 10th, 2005 at 9:54:44 pm
CCM, although it’s true that Vince Young looked ordinary against A&M, he looked extraordinary in pretty much every other game, and in any normal year, he would absolutely deserve the Heisman… the reason Bush deserved to win in the landslide that he did isn’t because Young is a poor candidate, it’s because Bush is so freakin’ ridiculously good.
December 10th, 2005 at 10:15:14 pm
According to ESPN…
Bush was named on 99 percent of the returned ballots (884 out of 892) — the highest percentage in history.
What i want to know is what eight idiots didn’t think that Reggie was one of the three most outstanding players in the country?
December 10th, 2005 at 10:42:06 pm
Sorry Brendan, but I have to disagree with you on this one.
Vince Young had a poor game against Oklahoma State, they were down 28-12 against the worst team in their Conference. He was ordinary against Ohio State, which was the only difficult opponent that they had all year.
The Big 12 has longstanding rivalries that make it exciting but it is overrated football. Texas will do as well in the BCS Championship game as Oklahoma has done for the past three years - Poorly.
USC had a much more difficult schedule. Teams like ASU. Cal and Fresno St were top 25 teams when they played USC. Those teams fell afterwards due to a combination of injuries and emotion, but they were tougher teams than the Big 12.
USC will win by at least three touchdowns. Plan to go out in the second half - it will be over at half time.
December 10th, 2005 at 11:08:14 pm
I certainly agree that the Big 12 sucks and USC’s schedule was tougher than Texas’s. I don’t agree that the Texas game will be as easy as the Oklahoma game was, but we shall see. Either way, however, it’s clear that the Heisman voters agree with me about Young. He received the most second-place votes of any player in history, thus reducing Reggie Bush’s margin of victory to half of what O.J.’s was, even though Bush got more first-place votes (percentage-wise) than O.J. did. So, whatever you and I may subjectively feel about Young’s worthiness, the fact is that Bush’s victory can’t be ascribed to Young’s weakness, but only to Bush’s strength.
December 11th, 2005 at 12:00:01 am
Congrats, Reggie. What a fine player.
December 11th, 2005 at 12:49:28 am
Total crap. What a joke. Reggie Bush winning the most votes in history, with the year Vince Young had, is just ridiculous. The media ejaculation over this guy makes me want to vomit.
December 11th, 2005 at 12:54:43 am
Yince Young received the most second-place votes in history. It’s not like the guy was disrespected. It’s just that Reggie Bush is, you know, better. Clearly better. So clearly, that the voters almost unanimously realized it.
It’s not “media ejaculation,” it’s recognition of head-smackingly bloody obvious: Reggie Bush is one of the greatest college football players ever.
Sucks to be Vince Young. Most years, he’d win the Heisman for sure. Also, if there was a “college football MVP” award, he’d win that for sure, even this year. But when it comes to deciding who’s the “Most Outstanding Player in College Football,” sometimes even a really deserving player gets beaten out by a vastly better player. That’s what happened.
If Young sticks around, though, he can take his shot next year…
December 11th, 2005 at 1:26:32 am
CCM -
As Paul Harvey would say, there’s more to the story. Texas ended up beating Oklahoma State by 3 touchdowns, and Vince Young had an incredible game. He ran for 267 yards, passed for 239 yards, and finished with 4 touchdowns.
Everyone talks about Reggie Bush’s 500+ yard game against Fresno State but he actually had about 360 yards of offense. Of course, that’s a great performance, but the rest was kickoff return yards due to Fresno State scoring and kicking off so many times. Vince Young’s 506 yards of offense against Oklahoma State might be the most impressive single-game performance in college football this season.
Young was also very good against Ohio State. He passed for 270 yards, ran for 76 more, and threw the game winning touchdown pass to complete a fourth quarter comeback. Just for perspective, Ohio State had never lost a home game at night before the Texas game. And, as you probably know, Ohio State was ranked 4th in the nation prior to that game and is currently ranked 4th as well.
USC and Texas actually played very similar schedules in terms of difficulty. Ohio State is as good as and possibly better than Notre Dame, Texas Tech is almost as good as Oregon, and beyond that neither team played a tough schedule. Fresno State is the third best team in the WAC, losing to Nevada and Louisiana Tech at home. Arizona State was a 6-5 team, and Cal finished 7-4. There isn’t much difference between those teams and Big 12 teams like Oklahoma and Colorado.
As to whether teams were demoralized by losing to USC, recall that Cal had already lost 3 games prior to the USC-Cal game and won handily the following week against Stanford. Arizona State won 3 and lost 3 after its USC loss, losing to Oregon, UCLA and Stanford.
I don’t know who will win, but I think the USC-Texas game will be a good contest between the 2 best teams in the nation with some of the best players to have played the game. Who can ask for more than that?
December 11th, 2005 at 1:56:19 am
Bush deserved the Heisman but he is not the best winner or even the best back ever to win it, so I am not sure what the vote total says other than the fact that Heisman voters ussually have their head up their ___es.
To think that Barry Sanders could have the year he had in 1988 and still not be the unanomous pick says about all you need to know about the quality of Heisman voters.
December 11th, 2005 at 2:12:05 am
John, or it says something about the other candidates in those years. Comparing different years is pointless because, well those years were different.
December 11th, 2005 at 2:36:14 am
Congratulations to Reggie Bush. He is an amazing athlete, and had an incredible year.
What does deserve serious debate though is how he is such a landslide winner over Vince Young.
Bush’s 500+ of total offense against Fresno was impressive, but as DRJ pointed out, 360 of that was total offense, wtih the rest coming on seven kickoff returns (19.3 yd. avg)and one punt return (16 yd avg).
Young put up 506 against Ok. St., with most of that coming in the second half.
The point least mentioned though, is that Bush is surrounded by Lienart, last year’s winner, as well as White and Dwayne Jarrett. No defense could focus on just shutting down Bush if they wanted to beat USC.
Young did not have that luxury. Surrounded by quite a bit of talent, he never stood in the backfield with another trophy winner. The focus of every defense that played Texas was stopping Young. Everyone else was a secondary threat compared to him.
In addition, Young had a better passer rating than Leinart, who had a better year than his Heisman winning season.
None of this is a knock to Bush winning the award. I could see it going either way, and do not envy the voters for having to make that choice. I just do not think 91% of the first place votes can be justified. 60%– sure, even 70% I could live with, but over 90% makes me wonder if the voters are watching the games, or checking out the SportsCenter highlights afterwards.
December 11th, 2005 at 4:05:08 am
jeff,
first of all Texas also played a weaker schedule and kept Young in well into blow out games. Bush and White often share duty, i.e. they aren’t in on the same plays. And talking about a quarter back having more passing yards than a running back has running yards is like talking about a linebacker having more sacks than a safety, its the nature of the position. Vince is a great quarterback, and in many years he probably would have won. But Bush was AMAZING. He was clearly the best player in college football this year. And the voters felt that Young was clearly the second best. Out of hundreds of players, being chosen number 2 is no slight
December 11th, 2005 at 4:54:49 am
1) Young got hundreds of yards in garbage time.
2) The PAC-10 is far superior to the Big-12.
3) Bush not only got pulled in the 3rd quarter half of his games, he shared carrys with White.
4) USC will win by better than 3 TDs and the game will be over by halftime.
December 11th, 2005 at 5:47:59 am
One of the things that gets me is how cool i thought it was seeing the four Heismans in heritage hall when I first visited USC. Who could have imagined that six years later they’d add three more. Certainly no one who watched the Trojans play that year :-)
December 11th, 2005 at 5:57:15 am
Yeah… remember when they set the Pac-10 record for penalties against Oregon? Ah, that was a glorious day. :) I also remember how we kept the conference standings updated on our whiteboard for a while, and then at some point I just erased them and wrote under the “Pac-10 standigns” heading: “OH, NEVERMIND.” heh.
December 11th, 2005 at 6:23:42 am
LOL, so true, so true. The Huskies finished second in the Pac-10 that year, with Stanford first. UCLA finished second to last, and Wazzu finihsed dead last, hell they lost to Idaho that year. Those were the days…
December 11th, 2005 at 6:25:29 am
Incidentally, look at this quote from Vince Young:
Young said he intends to stay at Texas for another year — and perhaps another shot at the Heisman.
“Right now, I feel like I let my guys down,” Young said. “Right now, I feel like I let my family down.”
So he leads his team to an undefeated season, second place in the country, a shot at the national championship, and is rated the second best player in the entire country (the best QB) and he feels like he let people down? OK, i’ve heard of setting high standards but thats just NUTS.
December 11th, 2005 at 8:48:10 am
David-
That’s why Vince Young is a great college QB and you and I are not.
December 11th, 2005 at 1:59:54 pm
Historical Heisman voting indicates a clear trend toward recent landslide winners. Per this link,6 of the 10 biggest percentage winners occured since 1991:
http://www.stiffarmtrophy.com/topwinners.html
But is this “lockstep” voting less informed(more political) than in season’s past? Today’s voters have access to more games and comparitive stats than ever before - and today’s selections are obsessively scrutinized by an unprecedented horde of interested ‘watchdogs’. I sense that today’s voters are under more pressure than ever to “get it right”.
O.J.’s 1968 tally still impresses me the most. Not to disparage Bush, but winning 90 percent of possible votes should happen again before too long if sports media trends continue.
December 11th, 2005 at 2:27:10 pm
“jeff: first of all Texas also played a weaker schedule and kept Young in well into blow out games.”
“Gravatar:
1) Young got hundreds of yards in garbage time.
2) The PAC-10 is far superior to the Big-12.
3) Bush not only got pulled in the 3rd quarter half of his games, he shared carrys with White.
4) USC will win by better than 3 TDs and the game will be over by halftime.”
Is this what passes for reasoned debate here or is this a fan site for USC? I guess I really know the answer to that - after all, it’s called The Irish Trojan’s Blog” - but Brendan’s posts and articles are generally logical. I expected the same from his commenters.
To say that Vince Young’s stats came from “garbage time” because he played in “blow out” games proves that your commenters haven’t watched any Texas games. Maybe you watched the nationally televised Texas A&M game, in which Young’s performance was merely adequate (for him), but even in that game Young was pulled when the outcome was clear. You guys are taking your talking points from ESPN. Hey, that’s fine, but talk about what you know (USC and Notre Dame), and don’t act like you are knowledgeable about Texas or the Big 12 because you obviously aren’t.
The remaining statements - “PAC-10 is better than Big 12″, “Bush got pulled”, “Bush shares time with others”, and “USC will win by 3 TDs” - are rank speculation unsupported by any facts. Maybe everything you say is true, but the only facts that have been posted in the comments here suggest otherwise.
I have no problem with trashing Texas where it deserves it (think basketball). I suggest you Irish fans in particular rethink your attitudes - after all, what if it had been Notre Dame instead of Texas and Brady Quinn instead of Vince Young? Because next year …
December 11th, 2005 at 2:37:17 pm
I would have voted for Bush and thought he should have won it last year - though it pains me to say that because most of the country is rooting for USC to fall off in the ocean. One of the more despicable places in the country.
Bush was the best player in my book this year - but the best of all time? That remains to be seen. But the arrogance of USC and Notre Dame fans continues to astound me.
Though from the Big 12, here’s hoping Ohio State beats the hell out of Notre Dame and Matt Leinhart finally gets some pressure. I believe Leinhart will be, at best, an average NFL quarterback.
Bush on the other hand may be the next coming of Barry Sanders.
December 11th, 2005 at 6:41:33 pm
The remaining statements - “PAC-10 is better than Big 12″, “Bush got pulled”, “Bush shares time with others”, and “USC will win by 3 TDs” - are rank speculation unsupported by any facts
HAHAHAHAHA, the only one of those that is speculation is the last comment.
“Bush shares time with others”
Hmm this one is pretty much facts based.
“Bush got pulled”
This one too.
“PAC-10 is better than Big 12″
Lets see, in the Pac-10 we have
USC 12-0 ranked #1
Oregon 10-1 (loss is to USC) ranked #5
UCLA 9-2 (one loss to USC) ranked #17
Big-12
Texas 12-0 ranked #2
Texas Tech (one loss to Texas) ranked #15
The Pac-10 has 3 out of 10 ranked in the top 25, the Big 12 has 2 out of 12.
The Pac 10 has 2 out of the top 5, the Big 12 has one.
Not to mention that the best team the Big-12 could field last year got utterly crushed by our best.
December 11th, 2005 at 7:02:37 pm
To say that Vince Young’s stats came from “garbage time” because he played in “blow out” games proves that your commenters haven’t watched any Texas games.
Or not.
The only other quarterback who played at ALL this year was Nordgren. His stats (what little of them there are can be found here
In 5 of the 12 games all he did was hand off the ball or did not play, because he has no rushing or passing stats in those games. In the other games his most active game appears to be against rice, in which he had 4 passes and 2 rushes.
This does not mean that Young is a bad quarterback, I think he is second best in the country (i think Leinert is better overall) and most people think he is THE best. But it doesn’t change the fact that Mack Brown has no problem running up the score by keeping his starters in game after game, and that Youngs stats have benefited from this.
December 11th, 2005 at 8:51:33 pm
Thank you, Brendan, for the opportunity to post comments on your blog. Perhaps we will meet again next year to discuss the relative merits of Vince Young and Brady Quinn.
David, your point comparing the Pac-10 and the Big 12 is logical and you provide facts to support your position. I continue to believe that they are comparable conferences for the reasons I stated earlier, but I acknowledge there is merit to your position.
As to the other items, “HAHAHAHAHA” and “LOL” are difficult arguments to refute so I guess we will agree to disagree.
December 11th, 2005 at 9:05:55 pm
David: Citing the Nordgren stats proves you haven’t watched any Texas games. His playing came after Texas held a commanding lead and his role was to hand off, repeatedly, so as not to run the score up. If you had seen the games, you would know that Texas rarely left Young in after a few minutes into the 4th quarter except in contested games, and did not run the score up except (arguably) in the Big 12 final against Colorado - which was probably done to help Young’s Heisman chances. In the remaining games, Texas put Nordgren in and ran the same running plays over and over.
December 11th, 2005 at 9:30:44 pm
I actually don’t think it’s arguable that Texas ran up the score against Colorado. They were already up 70-3 midway through the third quarter, and I was speculating whether they would break 100. But then they just stopped. I don’t think it’s reasonable to ask a team to stop playing hard prior to midway through the third quarter. It’s not Texas’s fault Colorado didn’t even remotely try.
December 11th, 2005 at 9:52:17 pm
i’m not quite sure why the number of votes matter (does it?) and why people are making such a big deal about how much of a landslide of a vote it was. Were the number of votes THAT surprising!?!
Reggie won… USC got another Heisman winner… get over it.
December 12th, 2005 at 12:17:57 am
DRJ, first of the hahaha was because you stated that 4 things were all speculation and unsupported by facts, of which only one of those was speculation, the others had two statments of fact based on things that had allready happened, and the other was an opinion which could indeed be supported by facts.
As for the Texas games, your right, I didn’t see more than a couple. But in most of those games the score was well in hand during the third quarter. In similar situations USC had their back up playing some significant time. Mack Brown has no problem keeping his starters in longer than many coaches would, its one of the reasons I am not a fan. I don’t think thats a knock against Young btw, I don’t blame any player for trying to do their best as long as they are in the game. But the fact of the matter is that part of the reason Youngs stats were as high as they were is a result of being in the game longer.
April 18th, 2006 at 5:15:19 pm
shit you think reggie bush is mister great you better take another look Quamin is on a mission come out to New Jersey mellvile and see what i am like i am 5-11 263 and run a 43 flat yes and very strong im a running back and i do cut like crazy so you better bring a video or something it worth lots of money dont for get 120 north high ST apt 21 my number is (856)503-4313 and thats all for today thank you very much