[CTcard]

One of the things that drive my sceptism is the fact that some (many?) voters cast their ballots before last weekend and a few even admitted to never had seen him play.  Pathetic.

Except do you actually know any of that?

The only place I heard reference to voters not seeing McCaffrey play was an offhand, not-specific comment by the broadcast booth during the Pac 12 CCG.
[not-quite-quote]
Guy 1: McCaffrey's really putting on a show, making a strong statement for the Voldemort.
Guy 2: But you know what the problem is? With Stanford on the west coast and playing so many late games, some voters haven't even seen him play.
[/not-quite-quote]

To some extent that has been parroted on some sports talk shows.
So - was that an actual survey of voters asking whom they had watched or an off-hand comment that seemed to match the preset narrative?


I heard the cast ballots early part a little more often, mostly by random sports-radio hosts.
[not-quite-quote]
Guy 1: You know the Voldemort's just a beauty contest that's hard to take seriously. Some guys don't even wait until after all the games to cast their vote.
Guy 2: Yeah, well maybe they have a point. It's like in baseball where some voters believe they should vote for the player awards before the playoffs so they're not biased towards players on better teams.
[/not-quite-quote]


------------------
Now, there are a lot of Voldemort voters. I am sure there are some who haven't seen McCaffrey play (much) - for that matter I am sure there are some who haven't seen Henry play (much) (and more of those on this board?). There are also undoubtedly some ballots sent in before the final games were complete - most years I have heard people claim 10% but it's never been very clear those people knew actual numbers. Most of what is out there on the topic is idle talk about things that are probably true - not some sort of investigative revelation.

-------------

Anyway, if you are interested here is a partial list of voters somebody tried to put together two years ago. Doubt there is much turn-over, though they say the list is incomplete. It is long.

http://www.stiffarmtrophy.com/heismanvoters/

-----------------
EDIT and P.S.

Lombardi is doing his best to drum up McCaffrey support (after the fact), but I have no idea what he is talking about as he repeatedly writes,

Entering the Rose Bowl, McCaffrey is averaging 8.3 yards per touch. That's the best mark in college football history, just a smidgen ahead of Barry Sanders' 1988 record average -- 8.2.

There are literally over 100 players this year who have averaged over 10 yds/touch - which would translate to about a bajillion who have averaged better than 8.3 yards per touch all purpose.
All this really means is he averaged a bit more per touch than Sanders did in his record breaking season - that is a point worth noting but it is not what he wrote.

http://espn.go.com/blog/pac12/post/_/id/...-this-time

[CTcard]

One of the things that drive my sceptism is the fact that some (many?) voters cast their ballots before last weekend and a few even admitted to never had seen him play.  Pathetic.

Except do you actually know any of that?

The only place I heard reference to voters not seeing McCaffrey play was an offhand, not-specific comment by the broadcast booth during the Pac 12 CCG.
[not-quite-quote]
Guy 1: McCaffrey's really putting on a show, making a strong statement for the Voldemort.
Guy 2: But you know what the problem is? With Stanford on the west coast and playing so many late games, some voters haven't even seen him play.
[/not-quite-quote]

To some extent that has been parroted on some sports talk shows.
So - was that an actual survey of voters asking whom they had watched or an off-hand comment that seemed to match the preset narrative?


I heard the cast ballots early part a little more often, mostly by random sports-radio hosts.
[not-quite-quote]
Guy 1: You know the Voldemort's just a beauty contest that's hard to take seriously. Some guys don't even wait until after all the games to cast their vote.
Guy 2: Yeah, well maybe they have a point. It's like in baseball where some voters believe they should vote for the player awards before the playoffs so they're not biased towards players on better teams.
[/not-quite-quote]


------------------
Now, there are a lot of Voldemort voters. I am sure there are some who haven't seen McCaffrey play (much) - for that matter I am sure there are some who haven't seen Henry play (much) (and more of those on this board?). There are also undoubtedly some ballots sent in before the final games were complete - most years I have heard people claim 10% but it's never been very clear those people knew actual numbers. Most of what is out there on the topic is idle talk about things that are probably true - not some sort of investigative revelation.

-------------

Anyway, if you are interested here is a partial list of voters somebody tried to put together two years ago. Doubt there is much turn-over, though they say the list is incomplete. It is long.

http://www.stiffarmtrophy.com/heismanvoters/

-----------------
EDIT and P.S.

Lombardi is doing his best to drum up McCaffrey support (after the fact), but I have no idea what he is talking about as he repeatedly writes,

Entering the Rose Bowl, McCaffrey is averaging 8.3 yards per touch. That's the best mark in college football history, just a smidgen ahead of Barry Sanders' 1988 record average -- 8.2.

There are literally over 100 players this year who have averaged over 10 yds/touch - which would translate to about a bajillion who have averaged better than 8.3 yards per touch all purpose.
All this really means is he averaged a bit more per touch than Sanders did in his record breaking season - that is a point worth noting but it is not what he wrote.

http://espn.go.com/blog/pac12/post/_/id/...-this-time