Heisman Trophy 2011: Why Each Candidate Deserves to Win

It's difficult to say if there's ever been a deeper and more wide-open field of legitimate contenders for the Heisman Trophy in a single college football season. The fact that five guys got invitations to the Downtown Athletic Club—and that Matt Barkley and Case Keenum weren't among them—only emphasizes that very point.

Any of the quintet of attendees to Saturday's ceremony would be a worthy winner, and here's why.

Andrew Luck

He came into the season as the front runner and he's the only repeat nominee of the bunch.

Luck has led Stanford, a school known far more for its academics than its athletics, to two BCS bowls in as many years, even after losing Toby Gerhart and Jim Harbaugh consecutively. The numbers don't exactly lie either—completing 70 percent of his passes for 3,170 yards with 35 touchdowns and just nine interceptions.

The only knock against Andrew Luck? He never won the Pac-12.

Trent Richardson

He's the most "Heisman-esque" of any candidate in the running—a prominent offensive skill player on a team competing for the national championship. Richardson's stats (1,583 yards rushing, 23 touchdowns) are also comparable to those of his predecessor, Mark Ingram, who became the first Tide-Roller to win the Heisman...as a sophomore, no less!

Richardson has been every bit as good as Ingram was, if not more so, on a team not all that dissimilar from the one Ingram carried to the 2010 BCS National Championship. If you're a traditional Heisman voter who values production on one of the best teams as opposed to being THE best player, Richardson is your guy.

Robert Griffin III

He's responsible for the most cases of slack jaw among college football fans this season. No kid in the nation has done more to wow and amaze on a weekly basis than RG3.

And that's without regular exposure on national TV. The fact that Griffin carried Baylor to nine wins, including victories over Oklahoma and Texas, should be reason enough for him to carry home a bronze statue or two.

His numbers weren't half bad either—3,998 yards with 36 touchdowns and just six picks through the air, 664 yards and nine scores on the ground.

If the Heisman has anything to do with leaving fans in awe of the sport then RG3 is the man to beat.

Tyrann Mathieu

He's the best player who makes the most impact from game to game on the best team in America. When he wasn't busy making opponents wish they'd never touched the ball or knocking it out of their possession, the Honey Badger made his impact on special teams, returning punts and kicks like it was nobodies business.

And eating rattlesnakes, of course.

But mostly just terrorizing the offenses of LSU's opponents. Mathieu's contributions—intimidation, fear, loathing in Las Vegas—go far beyond anything a simple stat sheet could possible convey.

Not to mention, his team is the only one in the land that's still undefeated. Think he had anything to do with that?

Well, do ya...punk?

Montee Ball

He's on pace to break Barry Sanders' NCAA single-season touchdown record. Yes, Barry Sanders, who set the NCAA record for rushing yards in a campaign in 1988 while claiming the Heisman Trophy as his very own.

Ball currently leads the nation in rushing yards (1,759) and rushing touchdowns (32) while playing for a Wisconsin team that won the Big Ten and is headed to the Rose Bowl as a result.

Granted, Ball might not even be the best player on his own team (not with Russell Wilson around), but that does little diminish just how prolific he truly was for a team missing its top running back (John Clay) and two of its offensive linemen from a year ago.

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