[CTcard]

With all due respect to Herbert and Costello, who may end up above-average Pac-12 QBs if their progression continues, I'll be quite surprised if either one wins the H-award. Or are even finalists.

Any one particular player winning the Voldemort is surprising, the odds are long against any particular individual.
By definition, that is much more true for a dark horse candidate.

However, neither are crazy picks for "someone who might emerge as a candidate".

Costello is young, seems to have the basic ingredients for success, and will be on a team that ought to be quite good next year.


Herbert is already a well above-average Pac 12 QB. This year his PER rating is 174.7. That would be first in the Pac 12  and third in the country (well ahead of poster-boys Rosen and Darnold) if he had played enough games to qualify. In the past decade, the only Pac 12 QBs with a higher rating over a season were: Vernon Adams 2015 (the year Oregon was great with him, terrible without) and Marcus Mariotta 2014 (Heistman winner). That's it.

Now that is a little skewed by the fact that Herbert missed some of the better defenses Oregon faced, but Herbert has been remarkably good for a season and a half now, since taking over the job as a true frosh. Pretty amazing for a guy who basically wasn't recruited out of high school. (He was from Eugene, thus the UO offer. Otherwise his offers were Northern Arizona, Portland State, Montana State.)

I don't know enough about Oregon or Cristobal (hey - I don't have a crystal ball on Cristobal) to have a good feeling for their chances of being a top team next year, but outside of Khalil Tate and draft eligible guys who might come back, I'd say Herbert is the next most likely Pac 12 Heistman contender.

[CTcard]

With all due respect to Herbert and Costello, who may end up above-average Pac-12 QBs if their progression continues, I'll be quite surprised if either one wins the H-award. Or are even finalists.

Any one particular player winning the Voldemort is surprising, the odds are long against any particular individual.
By definition, that is much more true for a dark horse candidate.

However, neither are crazy picks for "someone who might emerge as a candidate".

Costello is young, seems to have the basic ingredients for success, and will be on a team that ought to be quite good next year.


Herbert is already a well above-average Pac 12 QB. This year his PER rating is 174.7. That would be first in the Pac 12  and third in the country (well ahead of poster-boys Rosen and Darnold) if he had played enough games to qualify. In the past decade, the only Pac 12 QBs with a higher rating over a season were: Vernon Adams 2015 (the year Oregon was great with him, terrible without) and Marcus Mariotta 2014 (Heistman winner). That's it.

Now that is a little skewed by the fact that Herbert missed some of the better defenses Oregon faced, but Herbert has been remarkably good for a season and a half now, since taking over the job as a true frosh. Pretty amazing for a guy who basically wasn't recruited out of high school. (He was from Eugene, thus the UO offer. Otherwise his offers were Northern Arizona, Portland State, Montana State.)

I don't know enough about Oregon or Cristobal (hey - I don't have a crystal ball on Cristobal) to have a good feeling for their chances of being a top team next year, but outside of Khalil Tate and draft eligible guys who might come back, I'd say Herbert is the next most likely Pac 12 Heistman contender.