I thought Heisman Trophy winners were supposed to be jinxed, spooked, cursed … whatever.
Didn’t see any of that as Texas A&M dismantled Oklahoma in the Cotton Bowl. Has Johnny Manziel – aka Johnny Football – broken the spell?
My friend Roy made some reference to the “Heisman jinx” the other morning after Oregon clobbered Kansas State, which had its own Heisman Trophy finalist in senior quarterbackCollin Klein. The Ducks bottled up Klein and the Wildcats nicely en route to their 35-17 blowout in the Fiesta Bowl. I wasn’t lamenting any such jinx at the time, you know?
Now comes Johnny Football. For the record, he ran for 229 yards, passed for 287 more yards. Let’s see, that’s 516 yards in total offense – from one guy alone!
The rule of thumb here is that Heisman winners go into a serious swoon after they accept the trophy, although there are exceptions. Cam Newton at Auburn won the Heisman and then led the Tigers to the national championship over the (gulp!) Ducks in 2011.
Johnny Football, though, is a seriously special athlete. Something tells me he’s got another Heisman Trophy – maybe more – in his future.