Tennessee quarterback Hendon Hooker is not going to win the Heisman Trophy. Those hopes were dashed last week in Columbia, S.C. when the Vols lost to the Gamecocks.
I crossed him off my list as soon as I heard that his knee injury was season ending, which was what most thought during the South Carolina game. I’ve long had a rule as a voter that a player could overcome one missed game, but not two. Hooker missed about 1 1/2 games. That should preclude him, right? As a winner, yes. On my ballot, which has three vacant spots to fill, I’m not so sure.
Per oddsmakers, Southern California quarterback Caleb Williams is the heavy favorite to win the Heisman after his team’s win over Notre Dame on Saturday. Williams is in command of the Heisman race after completing 18-of-22 passes for 232 yards and a touchdown. While Williams was downing the Fighting Irish, Hooker was doing something entirely different.
With a torn ACL, Hooker made the trip to Vanderbilt when he didn’t have to. He could be at some clinic somewhere undergoing rehabilitation on his knee, which one would think would require surgery. Most often times, surgery requires one to wait for the swelling to go down. Well, sitting on a bus and cheering on his team from the sideline certainly couldn’t have helped the swelling on Hooker’s knee. Still, he was there, cheering on his team and, more importantly, being a leader. In fact, Hooker was at practice all week coaching up his team.
“He just showed up to work, was out there at practice with us, encouraging us and just doing what he does all the time,” Tennessee center Cooper Mays said. “
Imagine what impact that must have had on his downtrodden teammates after what all happened in Columbia. I’m rethinking my rule on Heisman voting.
Tennessee tight end Jacob Warren said no player is more important than any others, but Hooker is clearly the Vols’ leader.
“This is Hendon’s team and he has done so much to get us here,” Warren said. “And you know, even before the game he’s in the middle of the huddle just like he was when he was playing, breaking it down on the field and he’s on the sidelines, cheering guys up and just congratulating everybody, doing his handshakes with Joe (Milton III) and with all the other quarterbacks, and then in the locker room afterward he’s up there, dancing as much as he can. He can’t dance too much, but you know doing this thing and just getting excited for his guys. There’s never a doubt with him about how how he is going to show up for us and for the team.”
In my 15 years of voting for the Heisman Trophy, this has been the most wide-open race I can remember. I can make an argument for any number of players. Hooker is one of them. However, it would be impossible to make a strong argument for Hooker after the way things went down in Columbia. By comparison, Williams could win a conference championship. I think Hooker would agree that his gaudy stats shouldn’t overcome that. It’s pretty apparent that Hooker is a team-first player.
However, I do have three openings on my ballot that have to be filled. The award is set to go to the “most outstanding” player in college football. Even with the time he missed, isn’t Hooker in the top three considering how valuable he was to Tennessee’s incredible season? Without his play, the Vols wouldn’t have won 10 games this season. Without his leadership, the Vols could have imploded following losses to Georgia and South Carolina. They didn’t.
That’s a credit to Hooker. That’s reason enough for him to be on my ballot. I never make any definitive decisions until all the football has been played and I can sit down and make a rationale decision with all the facts. Therefore, I can’t say if Hooker will be on my ballot after the conference championship games on Saturday. However, if the votes had to be in today, he’d have a spot.
