Jackson Had a Great Year, but Mayfield Will Win the Heisman

Lamar Jackson’s 2017 might have been better than his 2016.

This fall, Jackson, Louisville’s junior quarterback, became the second player in top-tier college football to pass for 3,400 yards and rush for 1,400 in the same season. The first? That was Jackson last year, when he capped a breakout year by winning the Heisman Trophy.

But while Jackson is a finalist for the Heisman again, the odds that he will win the trophy for the second time are slim. On Saturday night, the Heisman will almost certainly go home with Oklahoma quarterback Baker Mayfield, a senior who threw 41 touchdown passes and led his team to the College Football Playoff.

Mayfield’s victory would be the sixth awarded to an Oklahoma player, a figure only exceeded by Ohio State, Notre Dame and Southern California. But the fact that Jackson is unlikely to become only the second repeat Heisman winner may have little to do with tradition, or even his totals. In fact, it is more likely a triumph of success as much as statistics: Mayfield’s Sooners went 12-1, while Jackson’s Cardinals finished the regular season at 8-4.

Here is a look at the finalists, which also include Stanford’s star running back Bryce Love.

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Baker Mayfield, Oklahoma

HIS CASE BY THE NUMBERS A senior, Mayfield passed for 4,340 yards and 41 touchdowns, with five interceptions and a 71 percent completion rate. He also was surprisingly frisky on his feet, rushing for 310 yards and five touchdowns, including a 54-yard run against Texas Christian in the Big 12 championship game.

SCOUTING REPORT Mayfield has been the closest thing to college football’s antihero this season: planting the Sooners flag at midfield at Ohio Stadium in September after avenging Ohio State’s victory last season in Norman; verbally mocking players for then-winless Baylor before their game; and making vulgar taunting gestures from the sideline against Kansas. (There was also the public intoxication arrest last February.) But Mayfield’s antics never seemed to overwhelm his stellar play, which was so crucial to the Sooners’ explosive offense, particularly as Oklahoma established itself as one of the country’s best teams. It will be very surprising if he is not hoisting the hefty bronze trophy Saturday night.

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Lamar Jackson, Louisville

HIS CASE BY THE NUMBERS A junior who won the Heisman last season, Jackson passed for 3,489 yards and 25 touchdowns in 2017, with six interceptions and a 60.4 percent completion rate. He also rushed for 1,443 yards and 17 touchdowns. Over all, he passed or ran for 42 of the Cardinals’ 59 touchdowns.

SCOUTING REPORT Jackson has arguably been even better than he was in his Heisman-winning campaign as a sophomore, but his team has been worse. Last year’s Cardinals were 9-3, with the final two losses coming late in the season; this year’s Cardinals were 8-4, with losses to lowlier teams. And Jackson did not have a signature game this year as he did in September 2016 against Florida State, when he ran for four touchdowns and threw for a fifth against a premier team in a nationally televised game. Put it all together — and compare Louisville’s berth in the TaxSlayer Gator Bowl to Oklahoma’s in the Rose Bowl — and Jackson is highly unlikely to defend his title.

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Bryce Love, Stanford

HIS CASE BY THE NUMBERS A junior, Love ran for 1,973 yards while averaging 8.3 yards a carry and scored 17 touchdowns, all despite an injury that kept him out of one game.

SCOUTING REPORT Love fits neatly into the narrative that West Coast stars are routinely overlooked in the Heisman Trophy race, and while it is true that recent Stanford standouts Christian McCaffrey and Andrew Luck have been Heisman runners-up (twice in Luck’s case), it is also true that three years ago Marcus Mariota won the Heisman as Oregon’s quarterback in one of the biggest landslides in the award’s history. The more pertinent reasons Love is unlikely to prevail are, first, the exceptional players mentioned above, and, second, a different, undeniable Heisman trend: a quarterback has won in 14 of the 17 seasons since 2000.