Friday Heisman blogging

Belated because I was having too much fun on this Nancy Clark saga.

• Love Potion #9

CFR loves holding up the Heismandments as pillars of the Heisman race.  But given the circumstances this year, and in re-examining those trusted laws, we think Pillar #9 might be a bit shaky.

It says "There will never be another two time Heisman winner".  Check.

This year will be a powerful test as to the strength of Heismandment #9, because Matt Leinart is Matt Leinart.  Jason White actually tried chipping away at ol' #9 last year, but managed only to raise some doubts as to its strength without actually toppling it.  That's because he finished third, but in a loaded field.  Maybe in another year with another field he repeats.  But the fact that he came fairly close makes us think that voters may slowly be getting ready for another repeat winner.

The repeat candidate this year is of course, USC's Matt Leinart.  Matt has a lot going for him here.  He's already won the award, has unbelievable name recognition, is playing for one of the nation's most storied programs, a program with rich Heisman history, he plays in the era's marquee Heisman position,  he has nearly unmatched success, not including whatever happens this season, and has great numbers.  Additionally, there will be strong talk and debate this season as to the validity of claims that he may be college football's best all-time quarterback.

All of that will be working in his favor come voting time, assuming he simply keeps doing what he's done (no easy task, mind you).  USC also happens to be in the middle of a shot at a 3-peat, unprecedented in the modern college football era.

If Leinart can come through during the regular season, even a loaded field will have trouble making a case against him given his historical importance and symbolism here.  In fact, his candidacy truly isolates that Heismandment #9 as a referendum on Matt Leinart.

If Matt Leinart in fact wins the Heisman trophy, Heismandment #9 falls, but it falls in an unusual way.  That is because Matt Leinart will become the standard-bearer for all future repeat candidates, and in doing so I think sets up a situation where Heismandment #9 becomes stronger because of just how powerful a candidate he is and his career accomplishment.  It may also make Heismandment #9 a referendum on a candidate's career, not his season.

If Matt Loses, he also becomes a standard-bearer for HM#9, because all future candidates will have to at least be on par with his contribution to the game since he in fact did not repeat despite coming in with so much.

If nothing else, Matt Leinart repeating gives a little more nobility to the repeat winner's club, since Archie Griffin was kind of an unusual repeat winner.

• Coming soon

We'll get to a fun AP ranking of candidate fields section this weekend or down the road, but its on ice for now.

• Nile Kinnick

In case you didn't know, 1939 Heisman Trophy winner Nile Kinnick is a near-God in Iowa.  The football stadium is named after him, and now a statue has been placed in his honor near the stadium.

Unfortunately, it has him holding some books and looking like something other than an athlete.

Ryan Suchomel at the Press-Citizen is unhappy about it.

I kind of agree.  The University could have easily had a Kinnick wing of the library or a Kinnick institute to remark on the great man and person he was, and still have put a statue of him in football pose in front of the stadium.  He's revered because he was a great football player. The icing on the cake and what makes him legendary in Iowa is that he was also an interesting guy off the field, but when building a monument to cake, you don't just depict the frosting without the cake.  So the people who commissioned the artist and gave him direction here missed the point, although their error is almost forgiveable when we consider how small sports really can be to the big picture.

• All Leinart, all the time

Matt Leinart's everywhere.

Here's a piece by FoxSports' Peter Schrager calling ML the "biggest man on any campus, ever".

Yes, he has a bit of a man-crush on Matt.  But the piece is pretty much dead-on.

My favorite, and it gets at just how unusual a case Leinart is---

What about the college athlete, though? Leinart's a true pioneer, a real-life Magellan. Never has a kid still taking Sociology 101 been such a visible force in the tabloids. In the past 12 months, the USC quarterback has been romantically linked to Jessica Simpson's personal assistant, Kristin from Laguna Beach, the point guard of the USC women's basketball team, and Alyssa Milano, who we'll always think of as Samantha Micelli from Who's the Boss. Hell, if he wanted, he could probably score Mona and Angela too. This is all from a guy who plays college football.

Matt also sat down briefly for an interview with blogger HeismanPundit for some discussion about the award.

HP: If you ... don't win it again, who do you think are the best candidates out there?
Leinart: Reggie Bush of course. Vince Young. Chris Leak has a really good shot if he does well in that system. Adrian Peterson, though who knows since he has a new offensive line. I got to know DeAngelo Williams from the Playboy All-American shoot. He's a good guy and a great player.

This one makes me wonder.  Leinart basically hints at offensive line issues for Peterson.  HeismanPundit has speculated before that Peterson may get injured again this year given previous injury issues and the fact that he's working with a new line and quarterback this year.  Leinart gives some validation to that.  He also hints at how powerful Florida's offensive system is, also discussed here and at HeismanPundit, and that if Chris Leak grasps the system, he should have a great season.

Matt Leinart needs a blog.  Oh wait, he did, but isn't blogging anymore.

That's because he's now part of USC's non-campaign campaign, MattReggieTV.com.  Check out the first video, pretty cool, as it follows Matt around Pac-10 Media Day.  USC is calling it a VLog, short for VideoLog.

It should work out well, because both gentlemen are very telegenic.  Gotta play to your strengths.

HeismanPundit already has reaction.  Called it.

And lastly on Matt Leinart, we'd like to leave you with his odd fashion choice at Pac-10 media day, his new beard: