Heisman Watch: 4 Better and 4 Worse

The 2011 college football season is underway and the Heisman watch along with it. The Heisman Trophy is without a doubt the most prestigious individual award in college athletics and week to week it's become almost as rich a discussion who will win as the rankings. 

Each Monday I will present "Four Better and Four Worse," which will view four players who helped themselves in the Heisman hunt and those who were hurt. Note that this isn't intended to be a ranking. It's merely a list according to who got the most help, and who was hurt based on the previous week's performances. 

I will interlace the two, ranking them according to how much they were helped or hurt. The No. 1 ranking for "worse" then will be the player who took the biggest hit. 

Worse Four: Michael Dyer

On the bright side, in the fourth quarter he gained 40 yards on one drive and scored the touchdown that launched the Auburn comeback against Utah State. He added another touch to bring the Tigers within two points. 

On the other hand, he did virtually nothing before that, gaining just 10 yards on eight carries. This came against the team that was one of the worst at defending the run last season, yielding 438 yards per game.

The two touchdowns were nice but a Heisman candidate shouldn't be struggling against a weak run defense. If he can't pound Utah State, what's he going to do against LSU and Alabama?

Better Four: Landry Jones

Landry Jones only had one touchdown pass, but he had the Sooner offense moving well all game long passing for 375 yards. Now granted it wasn't against the most stellar defense in the league, but for a favorite to do what he is expected to do is all he needs. 

You could just as easily substitute Andrew Luck here, who threw for 176 yards and two touchdowns leading the Stanford Cardinal to a dominating 57-3 win over San Jose State. 

The two players are still two of the top candidates and by just putting up solid performances helped themselves. 

Worse Three: Trent Richardson

Trent Richardson had three touchdowns, so that's good. He also had only 30 yards on 13 carries and one 16-yard reception. That's not so good, especially when you count that his opponent was the less-than-stout defense of Kent State 

In fact, in terms of yards, Richardson wasn't even the best back on his team as both Jason Fowler and Eddie Lacey out-gained him on fewer carries.

Overall the Crimson Tide won convincingly on the scoreboard, but with their quarterbacks combining for four picks and Richardson being stifled on the ground—it was sloppy. Richardson will need to do better than that against better teams to win the Heisman.  

Better Three: Montee Ball

Montee Ball had a real ball on Thursday night. He had 129 yards of total offense and four total touchdowns. The production also came in a nationally televised game which adds to the benefit.

He outperformed his backfield mate, James White, who will probably still get a fair chunk of carries. The reality is that White and Ball will probably be splitting the carries most of the season but at least for now, Ball sits on top.  

Worse Two: Denard Robinson

Michigan won convincingly in a game that was anything but ideally suited for Denard Robinson's still set. As one of the preseason favorites he needed a big game to stay on top and he didn't get it. 

In fact while he didn't have any mistakes he didn't do anything of significance either. He accounted for only 98 passing yards and 46 rushing yards. Some of that may be attributed to the weather. 

Whether it is more the weather or new coach Brady Hoke's scheme will have to wait until next week to see. For now though, it's clear that other quarterback favorites Luck and Landry have taken a step away from Robinson. 

Better Two: Kellen Moore

The fourth quarterback who had a lot of preseason buzz was Kellen Moore who has had one of the better quarterbacks and having grabbed his first win of the season now sits just seven games away from the career win record. Moore has a good chance at moving into the top five of all-time quarterbacks in college football as well. 

He started off this season brilliantly, racking up 261 yards and three touchdowns against Georgia in one of the few games that pitted ranked teams against each other. He did so having lost his top two receivers to the draft.

He picked apart the Bulldog defense using nine different receivers. It was an outright impressive performance in a big, prime-time game. 

Worse One: LaMichael James

LaMichael James didn't quit. That said, he was mostly stifled through game against LSU. He gained 38 of his 115 yards of total offense on the final drive against the Tigers second-string defense. Other than that in the second half, he only had a total of two yards in total offense. 

It was a game that was needed for Oregon who wanted to compete for the national championship. It was the most-watched game of the week, and the most-discussed game of the week. During the time when LSU took control of the game James was barely heard from. 

It's going to be hard for him to rebound from that, though he'll probably put up some huge numbers against lesser opponents. He's not out of the race, but he didn't do himself any favors this week. 

Better One: Robert Griffin III

Robert Griffin III was a long shot, a dark horse a week ago. No player did more to shoot into everyone's consciousness than Griffin did. He was huge. 

Griffin threw for 359 yards and five touchdowns in a prime performance which featured the weekend's most exciting game. He did it against a ranked team and the NCAAF's best defense for three years running. It was, simply put, phenomenal.

If he can maintain similar production against Big 12 competition look for him to be very much in the Heisman talk as the season progresses. For now though, he did more than anyone else just by getting in the conversation.