Heisman Finalists 2011: Robert Griffin III Should Win Instead of Andrew Luck

Heisman season is upon us, but sadly it seems like an afterthought with the all-SEC “national championship” game coming and the amount of publicity that is going to be shoved down our collective throats. Let’s ignore that for a second and reflect on who should win the most prestigious award in possibly all of sports, the Heisman Trophy.

The basic criterion that I use in deciding who to vote for is personal statistics, because it is a reward for an individual player and not the team as a whole, and the impact that they have had on their program.

Based on that, I would have to say that Baylor quarterback Robert Griffin III should be this year’s winner. I can simply say that taking a go-nowhere program that typically played the role of Texas’ personal whipping boy to two consecutive bowl games—while in the process beating TCU, Oklahoma and Texas, and also barely losing to Kansas State—is a remarkable achievement to say the least. When looking at those games you can attribute those wins and newfound success, for the most part, to Baylor having No. 10 playing at quarterback.

Andrew Luck is the only other candidate that can also win the Heisman. Not only did he help win last year’s Orange Bowl for the Cardinal, but he is the probable first pick in the upcoming NFL draft. He has also been a key component in Stanford’s second consecutive BCS bowl appearance.

However, when comparing Luck and Griffin, one key fact remains: Stanford was predicted to possibly win the Pac-12 and compete for a national championship appearance. Based on those expectations it is easy to see that Luck may have fallen short and that Griffin has benefited from not-so-lofty expectations.

Stanford also cannot attribute all of its success to Luck, because no single player can simply get their team to a BCS bowl; it is a team effort and Stanford is actually a pretty good team. Baylor, on the other hand, other than Robert Griffin, is simply not up to par. There is barely any talent around him, which may in fact be the reason why Baylor doesn’t have as good of a record as Stanford.

The problem that I have with Luck winning the Heisman instead of Griffin is that they only played two good to great opponents this season, Oregon and USC. Luck did not have a very good game against Oregon and Stanford had a hard time beating a sanctioned-inflicted and bowl-ineligible USC.

Baylor, on the other hand, was able to beat very talented and great teams this past season that they should have in fact lost to. I mean, beating Oklahoma alone is a very impressive achievement. I can afford to give Baylor the benefit of the doubt in losing to Texas A&M, because it was in College Station and they have, at least on paper, a much more talented team than Baylor and actually were supposed to be in the running for a Big 12 Championship.

Stanford losing at home to Oregon, the most important game on the schedule, is not as forgivable in my mind. It would be one thing if Stanford lost in a manner similar to when the 2007 Red Raiders beat Texas in the last seconds after Colt McCoy sent Texas on a scoring drive to take the lead. The reason why that would be forgivable is because Luck would not have been the cause of the defeat, or at the very least had played extremely well and should have won, but somehow the defense couldn’t hold their end of the bargain.

My argument can be boiled down to one point: Anybody who can nearly single-handedly turn around such a terrible program like Baylor and make them relevant and beat Oklahoma in the process deserves the Heisman.