A case for Shoelace.
After watching many of the pundits jump off the Shoelace Heisman wagon this week, it left me wondering how so much about a player can be judged by one game.
Yes, I realize that there is a lot of football left and we won't know the results of the upcoming games, but I was looking at a few numbers that stuck out to me regarding Tim Tebow's 2007 Heisman season.
The 2007 Florida Gators went 9-3 in the regular season. The Tebow hype machine truly got rolling after the Gators beat a mediocre Ole Miss squad where Tebow went off for more than 400 yards of total offense.
The next week, the Auburn D (Same Auburn squad that last to USF at home) held Tebow to 200 yds passing and 75 yds rushing. (Sound like MSU to anyone? Minus drive killing turnovers)
The Gators went on to lose to #2 LSU and #19 Georgia before Lloydfest in Orlando. Tebow finished the season with more than 4,000 yards of total offense and accounted for 55(!) touchdowns. A large portion of Tebow's gaudy numbers were posted against a variety of early and late season baby seals (Western Kentucky, Troy, Florida Atlantic). Make no mistake, however, that his performance against the SEC is what locked it up for him.
Denard Robinson is on pace for approximately 4,300 yards of total offense and 34 TD's. Ultimately, his Heisman campaign (and Michigan's hopes) depend of the results of the Big Ten tilt.
October 14th, 2010 at 11:04 AM ^
waiting for the "this thread has no Snickers" post.......
October 14th, 2010 at 11:05 AM ^
Good point, I'm swayed.
October 14th, 2010 at 11:06 AM ^
I think Shoelace would prefer to make his own case.
October 14th, 2010 at 11:08 AM ^
As Denard said, "the problem with the Heisman, only one person can win it. "
Jeez, this guy is something else
October 14th, 2010 at 11:07 AM ^
like/ want/ believe Denard will succeed? What's the point of this post?
Moreover, who cares if he wins the Heisman, we are about the team winning games. Individual rewards are nice, but irrelevant unless we win games. Why even worry about the Heisman?
October 14th, 2010 at 11:15 AM ^
Of course I want to see Denard succeed. The point of this post was me merely making a parallel betwen the two players with similar teams. Gaudy numbers by a star player that the team can't win without. Young defense that gives us a bunch of yards/points.
October 14th, 2010 at 11:20 AM ^
who has ever made a case against Denard?
Now, if you had the case for Obi Ezeh, that would be different.
October 14th, 2010 at 11:21 AM ^
That was actually my next post: "A giant case, cask or cupboard of FAIL for Obi Ezeh"
October 14th, 2010 at 11:16 AM ^
1) It'll help recruiting
2) Chances are if he wins we're at least having a decent season
3) It's another chance for us to 1)extend our lead over Sparty in something and 2) close the gap against tOSU in something that programs have pride in
If it didn't help the long term success of the program I probably wouldn't care but the truth of the matter is that it does so anything that helps us achieve that goal I'm "all in" for.
October 14th, 2010 at 11:56 AM ^
Heisman winners contribute to the prestige of the program and help with recruiting. When program accomplishments are discussed the number of Heisman winners is almost always included. Don't get me wrong the team accomplishments and records matter more, but do not discount the impact of having a Heisman winner.
October 14th, 2010 at 11:07 AM ^
I think a lot of people feel that Denard still has to prove he's not a flash in the pan. Sustaining his absurd production over five games to start the season was proof enough for most people, but because there honestly were no good defenses in that mix, the skeptics remain. I think if he puts up great numbers against Iowa, the question as to whether or not Denard is for real will be answered for good.
October 14th, 2010 at 11:08 AM ^
While Denard will end with some eye-popping stats this season, if he doesn't step up against Iowa, Wisconsin, and that school down south, he doesn't deserve to win any trophy. I think we would need to win two out of three of those games for him to be considered.
That being said, he's already a front-runner for next year IMO. He has a rare combination that will make him and this offense truly unstoppable, just as soon as he perfects that pass over the top.
October 14th, 2010 at 11:10 AM ^
Case closed.
October 14th, 2010 at 12:16 PM ^
is when he visibly shifts gears around the 19.
October 14th, 2010 at 1:24 PM ^
October 14th, 2010 at 11:10 AM ^
I don't think these guys watch much of the games they're talking about. I think it was just a bad game for him and he'll bounce back nicely.
October 14th, 2010 at 11:10 AM ^
You can put up gaudy numbers against those fast Southern Baby Seal U's and it's okay because it's balanced out by playing in the fastest, best conference in the history of semi-pro football.
October 14th, 2010 at 11:13 AM ^
We've played one good opponent thus far and Denard has one bad game. Is that merely a coincedence? As UM fans, we all say "total coincedence" but to the outside, they don't care.
Everyone likes to see the top dog go down and Denard fell after Saturday.
If you are a non UM invested 3rd party, why wouldn't you overreact to that?
October 14th, 2010 at 11:43 AM ^
.....give it credit for. They have played arguably a better schedule than MSU to date, and only had one more TD thrown against them than State. They held Stanford, a team averaging nearly 500yds of offense a game, to just over 400 yds, picked Luck twice, and held them to less yards than Oregon did, a team many believe has a very good defense.
Point is, we played two teams with similar D's and Denard had great success against one, on the road, and mediocre success against the other. If Denard played State as well as he played against ND, we just might be talking about going 7-0 this week, instead of many crying about the sky falling. Remember, he is just a sophmore, still young, and made mistakes last game he hasn't made yet this year, and none of it was really the result of State's D being that much better than what we have faced previously.
October 14th, 2010 at 11:18 AM ^
You're a poet and didn't know it!
October 14th, 2010 at 11:22 AM ^
+1 to whoever can go back and find this same topic posted on Tate from last season. Face it, it's time to go into "Shelve the optimism until this team shows some life against a competent Big Ten team" mode. This will prevent mental breakdowns for many of us for the remainder of the season.
October 14th, 2010 at 11:26 AM ^
I was not a member of the MGoBoard community last season. I spent a good portion of the 7 losses in a haze.
October 14th, 2010 at 11:31 AM ^
There was still optimism and all the recruiting talk that gave you hope. Plus this felt like the only place you could go without hearing all the "Michigan Man" talk and still find company after a loss.
October 14th, 2010 at 5:02 PM ^
+1 to whoever can go back and find this same topic posted on Tate from last season
Once again, Tate was never a serious Heisman candidate. A few people half-jokingly threw his name out there as a potential sleeper. Absolutely no one had him in their top five.
October 14th, 2010 at 11:24 AM ^
.......about that UF season, was that UF had virtually no other rushing weapon other than Harvin running end-arounds and outside pitches. Anywhere near the goalline and it was Tebow running it in. Tebow was a much better passer on the longer throws than Denard is at this point, hence his 32 TD's.
I don't believe that we will ever see another 30+ passing TD/20+ rushing TD season from a QB, even one like Denard. What we will see, IMO, is more yardage from Denard than Tebow, and more rushing TD's from our RB's. Different type players, IMO, and comparisons between one and the other don't make sense. For example, I don't remember Tebow ever breaking an 87yd run and running away from the defenders. We haven't seen Denard throw accurately on a long fly route, hitting his receiver in stride. Yet.
October 14th, 2010 at 2:30 PM ^
(Minus drive killing turnovers)
Other than that, How was the play Mrs. Lincoln?
October 14th, 2010 at 8:01 PM ^
I havent been this excited over Michigan football in a long time and over watching a player as exciting as Drob...
Go blue