It was clear to anyone paying attention: the creation of the national storyline of "Freshman vs. Defense" was a theme they were just itching to finally promote.
It was clear every time they put KSU on "upset alert" for every game of the season. It was clear in their television promo ads that intentionally left out Klein in the highlights leading up to the big night in New York.
It was clear by the near complete drop-off in coverage for Klein after the Baylor loss. It was clear the moment Texas A&M defeated Alabama in Tuscaloosa they needed a story to sell in a bigger state, a bigger market, and a bigger conference.
It was clear ESPN was going to declare the winner and 2nd place finish with two weeks left in the season and from that point, carefully script the next 2 weeks of advertising, promotional pieces, marketing, and coverage they wanted for a Texas A&M freshman to win the Heisman ... and that's exactly what they got.
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Klein and Snyder were the story as long as KSU was undefeated and defied every probable odd imaginable. That's a story ESPN could run with. That's an angle they could sell. Sure, KSU was in Kansas and yes, most of media has historically gone out of their way to disparage the blue collar tactics of Snyder and his relentless ... consistency.But this season was different.
This team had something no other KSU team since 1998 had, and that's a player that could be marketed as a possible Heisman. They had huge road wins over conference favorites OU and West Virigina.
As long as KSU stayed undefeated, Klein was expected to win in a Heisman landslide. At one point, as you probably recall, he had 15 of a possible 15 1st place votes at HeismanPundit.com.
There was no one to challenge him. No one that could catch his meteoric rise to national prominence. Even Notre's Dames LB, a fine player in all aspects, was still a defensive player and no one considered him much of a threat to dethrone Klein's and the 2012 Heisman trophy.
Amazing what one bad game will do ... at the wrong time.
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Here's another great fan read:Look through the lens of those in positions to influence public thought. This is what you see: Middle of the country. Little Apple. Small town. Heartland.
How quaint.
The fact that it's true doesn't make it any less of a story.
When it became clear that national public opinion was trending away from Collin Klein (Jackie got here much sooner than me, btw) I thought maybe the story alone would be enough. That Heisman voters would come to believe Collin's 'boyish good looks-aw shucks-I didn't kiss my wife until our wedding night' story would carry the day.
That Collin's story happened to be true and not contrived was just gravy.
Look at it this way.
The mere fact that Manhattan, Kansas even has a national identity is due wholly to the success of Bill Snyder and Frank Martin. Bottom line: If we do not win ballgames, there's no reason for anyone outside the K-State family (read: national opinion molders) to care.
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Being an undefeated team was sportscasting gold. It's a story that takes almost no real research. No hype. No special recognition. You can easily market to fans in all corners of the college football universe the glorious magic of an undefeated season.
Now it's down to six. Now five.
Now four undefeated teams remain.
Now ... there's only one .. and it's Notre Dame.
Even better. (We were tired of talking about Kansas State anyway.)
Each and every year, college football is simply about finding the storyline for ESPN, and most other media outlets, in general.
Will it be someone trying to repeat?
Will it be a non-BCS conference school running the table and crashing the BCS party?
Will it be a historically rich team rising from the ashes to win another championship?
Will it be an improbable rematch?
Will it be a player so dynamic NFL teams are losing ... just to have shot of drafting him?
This year was no different.
Once the Cats took the loss, it was now about focusing on what the storyline of the season was going to be, and that's Notre Dame in the title game against a team in the SEC trying to repeat and a freshman from Texas winning the Heisman in historic fashion.
Check aaaand ... check.
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Listen, don't just take MY word for it. Take Heisman Pundit's. Are they talking about THIS year, or next? So hard to tell ... this could just as easily been written about Klein.
The dominance of social media has shortened the news cycle from days to hours, sometimes minutes. Every interception or fumble or bonehead play is touted as "evidence" of general ineptitude.
Players are chewed up and spit out on a daily basis by the snark merchants. Who can survive that environment?
The mainstream media won't be able to help itself. It will tout Manziel as next fall's Heisman front-runner. When fans complain about Manziel being foisted upon them, they'll do an about face. That's how it always happens.
In the meantime, fresh faces are sure to appear on the scene with their own narratives and nicknames, their own statistically superior seasons for voters to latch onto. As new and exciting as Johnny Football is now, he'll be old hat by next fall.And if that wasn't enough ... a final reality:
All the things that had to go right for Manziel to win the Heisman this year -- the general collapse of the various front-runners, the perfect set-up in Tuscaloosa, the record-setting production and Kansas State's late-season collapse against Baylor -- will be tough to duplicate. Can lightning strike in the same spot twice? And remember that Johnny Football isn't exactly a big guy. He led a charmed existence in 2012, but his fearless style will continue to put him at risk of injury.
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Here's a Bleacher Report look at why Klein won't (didn't win):
For you to earn my consideration for the Heisman Trophy, you, the candidate, have to do two of three things.
First, your team has to finish as the best or second-best team in the nation. That means that your team will play for the BCS National Championship Game.
Second, you have to record great numbers.
Last, you have to be considered the most exciting and most dominant football player in the country.
Does Kansas State's Collin Klein stack up against Johnny Manziel and Manti Te'o in these three categories?The thing is, this is subjective criteria. Ultimately, that's the problem. Whatever stats you want to look at, you will. Whatever way you want to spin it, you can. How ever you define "exciting" and "dominate", is up to you.
No.
No, the Wildcats didn't finish 1 or 2. How does that make Te'o a better overall player?
No, Klein's numbers weren't as flashy as ESPN's candidate, but his offense, style of play, pace, etc. were far different. Did any voters watch the actual games?
The most exciting and the most dominant? That's certainly up for debate.
Which is why the Wildcat Nation feels so slighted.
Klein was in fact the most exciting player in the BigXII this season. He won the BigXII Offensive Player of the Year. He won the conference championship. He is the first player in college football history to rush for 20 and throw for 10 in back to back years. He consistently overwhelmed BigXII defenses with his saavy play calling, adjustments, patience, and toughness. He rarely made mistakes.
Sadly, all of that was brushed aside the second Bama fell to Manziel and Klein took a loss (late in the year). And while I certainly won't take that feat away from Manziel, it's not enough in my opinion to give him the trophy. His two losses to Florida and LSU were early, and the luck of the schedule allowed the hype to build over the last month of the season.
If Klein and the Cats had lost to Baylor early, say around the time Texas A&M was losing to LSU (Oct. 20th), this might of all gone down a lot differently.
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I ran the stats on JM since there is a prevailing notion he padded his numbers against weaker competition. Basically, I divided the OOC into one category, the SEC teams ranked #38 or less in the BCS in another category, and the top 3 in the BCS from the SEC in the final category.
The numbers speak for themselves as they should. Against the weakest teams on the schedule, he averaged 5.5 total TD's per game and 404 total yards.
Against the mid-level SEC teams, he drops to 3.6 TD's per game but his yards go up slightly.
Against the best in the SEC, he drops to 1 TD / 294 yards per game. And he takes 2 losses in the process.
The average BCS rank of the Texas A&M schedule was 54.7. KSU's was 53.5. It can't be said that Manziel's had a tougher road, and he played four COMPLETE cupcakes in the OOC (Klein only had 2 gimmes and also had to face Miami.)
He also avoided playing Georgia, South Carolina, and Vanderbilt (ranked 1st, 3rd, and 4th in the East) in that schedule.
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The Kansas City Star does their best to help us feel better about this CFB tragedy:
Collin Klein is, by nature and nurture, the perfect Kansas State football player. Humble and tough, the star who always points out he wears the Powercat like all his teammates, so everything he does, they do. He is the kind of player whose Heisman promotion kit features a purple bandage.
He doesn’t fit the NFL’s mold for potential star but is among the most efficient at what he does in college. Most comfortable out of the spotlight, or in pads knocking into someone.
Better than anyone expected, a classic dual-threat quarterback in the system that highlights those talents as well as any place in the country.
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The Alabama game was a big one, but it was near the end of the season.
Had the roles been reversed ... Had KSU defeated OU in the last few weeks of the year ... Had JM taken his loss to LSU at the end of season ... I think we can all agree Klein would of walked off that stage with the trophy in hand. It was unfortunately just a simple matter of timing. Really really bad timing.
That Alabama Heisman "moment" was no bigger than Klein essentially defeating OU with a devestating time consuming 4th quarter drive in Norman. Just because he didn't have to play from behind in the last seconds to win doesn't make it any less of a monumental win.
We can all agree the Heisman should not be considered a "career" award (even though in the past it has gone that way) we should also agree it should not be for just a single game, or moment, either. Klein's numbers over the course of two season, with incredible TD numbers to go with an obvious disparity of talent between KSU and some of the other teams in the conference, should also help his case.
But it didn't.
And now that this blog is written and over with, I'm moving on myself. (Don't even get me started on Te'O and whether or not he deserved to be 2nd -- that's a blog post for another day.)
Time to refocus on the task at hand ... slowing Oregon.
Or maybe they should be worried about slowing ... us?
