The curse of the returning Heisman Trophy winner
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Ryan McGee, ESPN Senior Writer
It was Dec. 13, 2008, in New York City and time for the three Heisman Trophy finalists to take their place at the front of the room, awaiting the announcement of who would win college football’s most coveted individual award. But one member of the trio was missing. The one who had been there before.
“I was in the bathroom throwing up,” Tim Tebow confessed nearly 16 years later. The Florida quarterback was there not simply as a Heisman finalist, but as the reigning Heisman winner, seeking to become the second two-time Heisman honoree and first in 33 years.
“Honestly, I didn’t think I was going to win it. I wanted to. Of course, I did. But when you watch the ceremony, what do you see? There’s us on the front row, and then there are all the people sitting behind us. Coaches and staff from your school, the president of the university, everyone. My entire family was there. My sister had flown in from a mission trip to Bangladesh, just for this. I knew there was a party after, with all those people, win or lose, and if I’d lost, I’d felt like I had let them all down. That’s why I got sick.”
Tebow didn’t win. He finished third behind a pair of quarterbacks — Oklahoma‘s Sam Bradford and Texas‘s Colt McCoy — despite earning more first-place votes than either of them.
“Winning the Heisman changes your life, there is no doubt about it,” Tebow said. “And people think, ‘Well, you won one, so the pressure’s off on the second.’ But it’s not. It’s a position every college football player wants to be in, but no one knows what that is like until they experience it.”
Caleb Williams is experiencing it now. The fame, hype, expectations, assumptions, all of it. And he’s the first to do so in this still-new NIL era, his Saturday performances — good and bad — punctuated by television commercials starring him. After a hot start to 2023, Williams and USC have scuffled midseason and his Heisman odds have plummeted.
The one person who has hated seeing that more than anyone not dressed in Trojans colors is the only man to have pulled off what increasingly feels impossible. Archie Griffin does not have any desire to be the only member of the two-time Heisman Trophy winner club. Honestly, he’d enjoy the company. It’s been pretty lonely in his corner of the room for the past 48 years.
“I don’t have to be the only two-time winner and I don’t really want to be,” the 69-year-old Ohio State legend said earlier this fall during a conversation about Williams. “I was the first. That’s plenty enough of an honor for me. I can’t wait to welcome the second.”
No. 45 let out a giant laugh with a shake of the head.
“But I’ve been waiting for a long time, haven’t I?”
Griffin, who stood at the front of the room at Downtown Athletic Club in 1974 and 1975, is and has long been, the living, smiling, complete opposite of that awards show scenario. He still returns to New York every December. And he still makes sure to shake the hand of every fellow Heisman Trophy winner in attendance, especially the person who has just become the newest designee as “the outstanding college football player in the United States…”
“In 1978, three years after I won it for the second time, I shook the hand of Billy Sims, who has become a dear friend,” Griffin said. “I thought, ‘Well, he’s a junior just like I was and he has a great team coming back at Oklahoma just like I did at Ohio State, so he will definitely be back here winning this again next year!’ But he didn’t. And there have been so many guys that I was so excited thinking about them maybe getting to experience that thrill a second time, especially now, when so many amazing young talented underclassmen win it. It’s crazy to think about, really.”
Yet, here we are. It would take a miraculous turn for Williams to repeat. Since Jason White finished behind Matt Leinart, this century alone, those who have returned to college for another shot at bronzed glory have gone 0-for-10, eight who went 0-for-1 and Tebow, who went 0-for-2.
But the possibility of claiming two stiff-arming statues didn’t begin with Griffin or begin to be scrutinized with a recent run of elite quarterbacks.
Times change, failure to repeat does not
The first winner of the Heisman Trophy in 1935, one year before the award was named for John Heisman, was Chicago running back Jay Berwanger. He was a senior. And so were the first 10 winners of the award. The junior who snapped that streak in 1945 was Army‘s Doc Blanchard, who in turn became the first candidate for a Heisman repeat. Unfortunately for the fullback known as “Mr. Inside” there was also a “Mr. Outside,” as in teammate Glenn Davis, who took the award in 1946 while Blanchard finished fourth.
Over the Heisman’s first four decades, from Berwanger through Griffin’s second win, those who had hoisted the stiff-armed trophy at season’s end had tallied 35 seniors and only five juniors, the first four failing to repeat, including the great Roger Staubach, who won the award in 1963 and then failed to even crack the top 10 the following year.
Sims came up one spot short in 1979, behind USC’s Charles White. And while the other failed Heisman defenses had been handled with gentlemanly grace, Sims growled his disappointment, saying when asked about his chances of a repeat after a disappointing midseason performance against Texas, “I don’t care. I have one already!” And after White’s Heisman win, Oklahoma head coach Barry Switzer angrily stumped at a news conference, suggesting that NFL scouts vote on the award, not the media, and adding, “Billy’s two years were better than Archie Griffin’s two years that he won the thing!”
“I think when you look back on that stuff now, you realize the pressure that came with it,” Sims recalled during a 2016 chat in his Tulsa barbecue joint sitting beneath a framed Sports Illustrated cover of himself and White playing tug of war with the trophy with the headline: “Hey Man, That’s My Heisman!”
“The year I won it I was kind of an unknown guy who kind of came out of nowhere. I was a great story. The next year, man, every question after every game was, ‘Well, do you think you can win the Heisman again? Charles White just did this and the quarterback at BYU [Marc Wilson] just did that. Did you do enough, Billy?’ I don’t care who you are or how tough you are, you are still a college kid. It’s a lot.”
Sims was just the sixth junior to win the award over 43 years. Of the 43 awarded since, 21 have gone to underclassmen. Of the first seven of those, from Herschel Walker in 1981 through Charles Woodson in 1997, all but one left early for the NFL. The lone holdout was BYU quarterback Ty Detmer, who returned after his record-setting 1990 campaign and battled through injuries to finish third in 1991. As he arrived in New York for the ceremony, he confessed, “I’m here to watch Desmond Howard win it.”
After Woodson, seniors ruled again. White, the Oklahoma quarterback who won in 2003 was a senior, but received an injury waiver to return and defend his Heisman the next year. He lost to Leinart, beginning the current era when a stunning 14 of 18 winners were juniors or younger. That “or younger” is no small development, as a longtime unwritten ageism agreement between Heisman voters was finally put to pasture by voters smitten with Tebow in 2007, the start of a three-year sophomoric streak. Then, in 2012, Texas A&M‘s Johnny Manziel won it as a — deep breath — freshman!
How did none of them win again? Those who came up short of sitting alongside Griffin give us a not-short list of reasons.
The circus
Heisman pressure is very real. So is temptation. Exactly what forms that takes is something that changes and evolves along with every other aspect of being an athlete at a high level college football program, as does how those athletes react to it. Griffin didn’t have to deal with social media or even cable television, but even still, Ohio State head coach Woody Hayes assigned a staff member to help Griffin manage the flood of requests from media and Ohio State supporters because, as Hayes explained at the time, “The kid is too nice. He has to learn how to say no.”
After Manziel became the first freshman winner in 2012, the following offseason, then-Texas A&M athletic director Eric Hyman assigned two staffers to the kid who had just been pinned with the now-infamous Johnny Football moniker — one to manage his schedule and the other to field autograph requests. Alan Cannon, who has overseen A&M’s sports information office since 1999, called his friends at Florida to see how they’d handled Tebow’s repeat performances. “They warned us that this wasn’t going to be about ESPN and CBS anymore,” Cannon recalled. “It would also be about the National Enquirer and TMZ.”
Hyman sat down with Manziel and his family, stating flatly: “Johnny is not a freshman. He’s not a sophomore, junior or senior. He’s a Heisman. We can’t act like this is normal because it’s not.”
As we know now, Hyman was a prophet. Manziel spent his entire Heisman defense becoming notorious, from exploding cigar-smoking party Twitpics to a pay-for-autographs scandal that nearly cost him his eligibility for the season. By the time he threw for 3,732 yards and 27 touchdowns — a 313-yard, three-touchdown improvement over his Heisman year — he lost by a whopping 1,501 points to another redshirt freshman, Florida State‘s Jameis Winston.
Winston stated at ACC preseason media days in the summer of 2014: “If I get Manziel disease, I want all of you to smack me in the head with your microphones.”
The reality is that he already had. He won the 2013 award despite 13% of voters left him off their ballots completely, due to a sexual assault investigation that ended with no charges filed only nine days before he became the youngest Heisman winner. Winston would also lead FSU to the 2013 national title. Then he proceeded to crash through a 2014 Heisman follow-up campaign that is still remembered less for football and more for questions about the handling of the sexual assault allegations, crab legs allegedly stolen from a grocery store in April 2014, and a bizarre midseason student center tabletop screaming incident that resulted in a half-game suspension for the biggest game of the season against Clemson.
It all resulted in a sixth-place showing behind Oregon‘s Marcus Mariota, the worst Heisman finish for a uninjured returning winner.
“I think in the decade since then, we have learned a lot about how to handle these things better, whether it’s a coach or a player or an entire athletic department,” Jimbo Fisher, Winston’s coach at FSU and now at A&M, said when asked about then versus now. “I know that the players handle the spotlight better, because now the great ones, they have been in the spotlight since they were kids, when you really think about it. But I don’t care who you are or your background or whatever, fame is fame. And being famous is hard.”
As Hyman recalled it in relation to Manziel: “At the end of the day, it’s a kid who’s trying to become a grown-up. They all are. You can’t babysit them night and day. All you can do is try and educate them on what they are now, a celebrity, and the world they are now living in. Even as that world seems to be constantly changing.”
Unreasonable expectations
Manziel wasn’t the only active Heisman winner to post better or at least just as impressive numbers the following year but was still unable to impress voters like he did the year before. Not even close.
The all-time example of that was Detmer. In 1991, the BYU quarterback went against the norm and returned to Provo for his senior year, the first Heisman winner to come back since Sims. His 1990 statistics were ridiculous, setting 21 NCAA passing records and tying five more as the Cougars finished 10-3 with a signature win over No. 1 Miami in Week 2. BYU marketers devised what is considered the first true Heisman campaign, mailing out paper neckties to hundreds of voters to remind them of, you know, Ty.
As the 1991 season started, Detmer was warned by LaVell Edwards, his Hall of Fame head coach, to not become too obsessed with topping the year before, and to remain in the here and now. It didn’t work. Detmer suffered injuries and BYU opened the season 0-3 against a slate of ranked teams. He was already in his own head before October.
“We are taught as football players and athletes that your goal is to always be improving, and how do you do that?” Detmer recalled last year. “You do it by being better than your last game. But if your last game was a dream game and your last season was the dream season, that’s a measuring stick that can be difficult to manage.”
He says now that the 0-3 start was an unintended blessing. It sent the spotlight elsewhere, for a while. But when BYU didn’t lose again (there were two ties) and he finished the year with another 4,000-yard season, it was enough to earn the Davey O’Brien and Sammy Baugh awards and another first-team All-American selection. But he finished third in the Heisman vote.
“I think that’s probably the greatest challenge, to top what you did, but for me it wasn’t so much about what others expected, though that definitely is on your mind,” said Bryce Young, who won the Heisman in 2021 as he led Alabama to a national championship. Young fought through a season of physical dings to “only” a 10-2 record and didn’t just finish sixth in the Heisman vote behind Williams, but was third among SEC quarterbacks. “For me, the expectations I had for myself were much greater. That’s where my pressure came from. Not to be unfair to myself.”
Injuries
Bradford, as Gators fans love to remind us, lost to Tebow in a grinder of a 2009 BCS National Championship Game, but was returning the following fall with an Oklahoma team that looked even better than the one that had just set a slew Big 12 offensive records.
In the season opener against BYU, he had just thrown a pass that topped fellow Heisman winner White’s Oklahoma career passing yardage mark but was blasted by a hit on the next play. He struggled with a severe shoulder sprain all season and became the first returning Heisman winner since Staubach in 1964 to finish outside the top 10 in voting.
Running back Mark Ingram won instead, becoming Alabama’s first Heisman winner. Days before the 2010 season opener, Ingram injured his knee and ended up having surgery. By the time he returned to action, he was forced to share carries with another future Heisman finalist, Trent Richardson. Ingram also finished outside the top 10.
“The one aspect of football you can’t control is getting hurt,” Bradford recalled in 2014, when an ACL tear cost him the entire 2014 NFL season with the Rams. “But what drives you to get back is to do right by your teammates. Every injury is frustrating, but it’s especially frustrating when you know you had a team that had a chance to do something special if you hadn’t let them down.”
Their team was too good
Sometimes, that team around a would-be Heisman repeater is also loaded with other stars.
It’s always been a crucial component to a candidate’s portfolio that they be on a team that makes a postseason run. But to do that, there has to be more than one great player on a roster. Sometimes that Heisman winner has to share stats, stage and votes with one of those teammates.
“Oh, I knew when I came back in 2004 that if someone on my team was going to win the Heisman it was going to be Adrian,” said White, who returned to Oklahoma after his 2003 Heisman win to share a backfield with Adrian Peterson. A self-described Heisman history buff, White knew about Army’s back-to-back Mr. Inside/Mr. Outside winners and wanted to do the same with himself and Peterson, who would set several NCAA freshman rushing records in 2004. Instead, they both went to New York as finalists, but lost to Leinart. Oklahoma fans still say that the split between Sooners cost one or the other the trophy. White’s response to that: “Great problem to have.”
Leinart, in turn, was back in New York the following year, having thrown for nearly 500 more yards than his Heisman season. He finished third behind USC teammate Reggie Bush and the player they faced a few weeks later in the BCS championship, Texas QB Vince Young.
“I wasn’t upset at all to lose to Reggie,” the former USC quarterback said. “You know, every Heisman winner gets a ballot. I had him No. 1 on my ballot. I was worried that I was going to take votes away from him and cost him the Heisman, not the other way around.”
Their team wasn’t good enough
Just call this the “Lamar Jackson Rule” — that unwritten rule about one’s team needing to compete for titles to remain Heisman relevant.
The Louisville quarterback won the 2016 Heisman, electrifying college football with a stat line of 3,543 yards passing with 30 touchdowns, 9 interceptions and a rating of 148.8, along with 1,571 yards and 21 touchdowns with his feet. The following season his stats were a nearly identical 3,660/27/10/146.6 in the air and 1,601/18 on the ground.
Yet, he went from runaway winner to distant third-place finisher behind Oklahoma’s Baker Mayfield and Bryce Love of Stanford. The difference? Jackson’s 2016 Louisville team spent the entire season on the big stage, ranked as high as third and ending the year 15th, even after a three-game skid that landed them at 9-4. The 2017 Cardinals never cracked the top 10, and after four pre-November losses, dropped out of the top 25 and out of mind.
“You can’t do it all by yourself,” groused then-Louisville head coach Bobby Petrino after Jackson accounted for 491 yards of offense and four touchdowns against Wake Forest … and lost 42-32 to drop to 5-4. “He’s had to. I think what he’s done has been more impressive than last year, but the voters won’t see it that way. They’ll want another guy.”
Voter fatigue
Petrino’s complaint isn’t uncommon. And he’s not wrong. Mayfield, who threw for 4,627 yards and 43 scores and took OU to the College Football Playoff, deserved the 2017 award. Even Jackson, whose family became close with the Mayfields during that awards season, has said that. But he has also recognized the reality of voter fatigue.
“I think once you’ve had an incredible season and it’s been a great story, everyone loves it, but maybe they want to learn about a new story, a new guy, something they’ve not seen before,” the Baltimore Ravens quarterback said last month. The 2019 NFL MVP started laughing as he said, “I’m not saying that people get tired of you when you’ve been around for a while, but then again maybe I am.”
Let’s go back to Tebow. He had comparable stats on the field in 2008 compared to his Heisman year and did it while winning the SEC and the BCS titles. And he did garner more first-place votes in 2008 but finished third because 153 of 902 voters left him off their ballots completely.
“Do they get sick of you? Well, I think some definitely got sick of me,” said the only player to attend three ceremonies as a Heisman finalist after he finished fifth his senior year (and helped winner Mark Ingram and runner-up Ndamukong Suh work off nerves in the hotel weight room). “But I will tell you this, and I think every guy who has won it and comes back for another year will tell you. I’d rather be blessed with success and they get sick of me and my team than them not think about us at all.”
Someday someone will finally win their second Heisman. It’s inevitable. At least it should be. Everyone believes that, from all of those winners who didn’t pull it off to the one guy who did. Though, yeah, if they’re being honest, even they are beginning to wonder.
“Yes, one day someone will do it. At least I think so,” Griffin said, again chuckling. “I just hope that when it does, I am still here to congratulate them in person.”
Baseball’s winter meetings are just around the corner, and we’re ready for some blockbuster deals.
We’ve already seen some intriguing trades this offseason with the New York Mets acquiring Marcus Semien from the Texas Rangers for Brandon Nimmo and the Boston Red Sox adding Sonny Gray to their pitching staff — but there are even bigger stars who could move in the weeks ahead.
With that in mind, we asked our MLB insiders to give us their preferred destination for some of the biggest names in our ranking of the top 25 MLB offseason trade candidates.
Where did we send All-Stars Ketel Marte and Byron Buxton? Which Red Sox outfielder is on the move in our deals? And which contenders get starting pitching help? Let’s find out.
The Arizona Diamondbacks should trade Ketel Marte to the …
The Mariners plucked from the D-backs to jolt their offense just five months ago, acquiring corner infielders Eugenio Suarez and Josh Naylor. They should do so again, this time for Marte, the star second baseman who can be had for the right return. The Mariners have a need for another bat, and Marte would represent a massive upgrade over merely re-signing Suarez or Jorge Polanco.
Marte would slide in perfectly ahead of fellow All-Stars Julio Rodriguez and Cal Raleigh, allowing Randy Arozarena to join Naylor in the middle of the lineup and giving Seattle arguably the best offense in the American League — to pair with what is likely the best pitching staff.
Coming off a gut-wrenching loss in Game 7 of the American League Championship Series, it’s the perfect move to push the M’s toward the first World Series berth in franchise history. And whether it’s Cole Young, Michael Arroyo or Felnin Celesten, the Mariners might have enough young, promising middle infielders to satisfy the D-backs’ likely desire for a Marte replacement without parting with Colt Emerson. — Alden Gonzalez
Boston Red Sox for Jarren Duran and Kyson Witherspoon
Roman Anthony‘s 2025 breakout rendered Duran expendable in an outfield already staffed by Ceddanne Rafaela and Wilyer Abreu, both of whom offer more remaining team control. And with presumed second-baseman-of-the-future Kristian Campbell struggling as a rookie (86 OPS+, -1.0 WAR), the door swung open for a move of this magnitude.
Duran’s proclivity for doubles and triples will play beautifully in Arizona (just ask Corbin Carroll), and Witherspoon, the No. 15 pick in the 2025 MLB draft, instantly becomes the club’s best pitching prospect. — Paul Hembekides
The Red Sox should trade Duran to the Philadelphia Phillies for a package including Alec Bohm
These lightning-rod players certainly are not coming off their best seasons and perhaps each needs the proverbial change of scenery. The Red Sox may need someone to play third base, and Bohm, while no match for Alex Bregman, is a capable hitter and defender. The Phillies could then get a more consistent third baseman who enjoys playing in Philadelphia. Duran would fill Philadelphia’s center-field need, and it would create some opportunity in a crowded Boston outfield. See, trades can work out for both teams! — Eric Karabell
The Cleveland Guardians should trade Steven Kwan to the Mariners
I love this idea so much. Kwan would return to the West Coast, about a four-hour drive from Corvallis, where he starred for Oregon State. He would give the Mariners a needed upgrade at a corner outfield spot, teaming with Julio Rodriguez to improve Seattle’s outfield defense. Most importantly, he could slide into the leadoff spot, offering contact and OBP as a poor man’s Ichiro, hitting in front of Cal Raleigh, Rodriguez and his old Cleveland teammate, Josh Naylor. Let’s get this done. — Bradford Doolittle
The Chicago White Sox should trade Luis Robert to the …
Rumor mill whispering has connected the Royals with Boston’s Jarren Duran for the hefty price of Cole Ragans, a swap I can’t abide. The Royals have starting pitching depth, but they don’t have ace depth and Ragans must stay. Duran isn’t an ideal defensive fit for Kauffman Stadium if you view him as a center fielder, and the Royals need to upgrade at that spot badly.
Enter Robert, whose work on strike zone judgment seemed to be paying off in the latter stages of last season. He’s younger than Duran and has more power upside without sacrificing speed and defense. The Royals’ new hitting staff is hyper-focused on improving pitch recognition, and I’d love for them to be new voices in Robert’s ear. The Royals could keep Ragans and modulate their rotation/prospect return based on Chicago’s willingness to pay down some of Robert’s $20 million for next season. Alas, this would be more palatable from a payroll perspective if the Royals had not already committed $8 million to run it back with Jonathan India. — Doolittle
Philadelphia Phillies
It’s time. Time for Robert to find a new home and time for the Phillies to mix up the vibe a little. It’s possible that last season proved to be Robert’s current floor — good defense and 33 stolen bases will help teams win games. But it’s also just as possible the ceiling is still within reach after years of underachieving. First off, getting away from the Sox did wonders for Gavin Sheets and Andrew Vaughn. The same could be true of Robert if he moves on, especially since he’s finally cutting his chase rate down.
Now put him in a good lineup with even better pitches to see — and perhaps a little more pressure to perform — and the Philles could just get the best version of him. He has hit 28 homers in a season. He hit .338 in another (partial year). Put it all together and he might turn into a steal. — Jesse Rogers
The Minnesota Twins should trade …
Byron Buxton to the Los Angeles Dodgers
This falls into the “Why? Because they can, that’s why” category. Enough is never enough for the Dodgers, so this offseason’s installment of making sure they have too much is the acquisition of the best available player at the position they may actually believe they need to upgrade. Move Andy Pages to left, slot Buxton into the top half of the lineup and go for three in a row. — Tim Keown
Joe Ryan and Ryan Jeffers to the New York Yankees
Ryan was a popular name at the trade deadline, and he’s popular again coming off an All-Star season with a rebuilding team and two years of team control remaining. The Yankees don’t need another front-line starter, but Ryan would give them some rotation stability early in the season with Gerrit Cole and Carlos Rodon (and Clarke Schmidt) on the injured list, and he would supply insurance should Cole or Rodón return later than usual or struggle upon return. And as these front offices like to say: You can never have enough starting pitching.
Jeffers would quench the Yankees’ need for a right-handed-hitting catcher after carrying three left-handed-hitting catchers for most of the 2025 season. He would platoon with Austin Wells and allow the Yankees to move Ben Rice, also a left-handed hitter, to first base full time. — Jorge Castillo
The Miami Marlins should trade Edward Cabrera to the New York Yankees for Jasson Dominguez If the Yankees are truly focused on keeping their payroll in check, they’ll need to be creative in how they address their roster shortcomings. Presuming that the team re-signs Cody Bellinger, the Yankees will already have spent a majority of their available free agent budget, and have rendered Dominguez excess with top prospect Spencer Jones also an in-season debut candidate. Dominguez is the kind of high-ceiling youngster the Marlins should be targeting.
Cabrera is a talented, albeit injury-prone, starter who can provide critical rotation depth while the team waits for the healthy returns of Gerrit Cole, Carlos Rodon and Clarke Schmidt. Dominguez’s two additional years of team control might make this a slight overpay for the Yankees, but Cabrera’s projected $3.7 million salary via arbitration could make him an ideal, budget-conscious acquisition. — Tristan Cockcroft
The Miami Marlins should trade Sandy Alcantara to the Athletics
Alcantara’s return from Tommy John surgery was a disaster in the first half of the season, as he entered the All-Star break with an ERA over 7.00. That made him untradeable; it made no sense for the Marlins to deal him at the trade deadline with his value at a low point. Alcantara found his groove over his final 12 starts, however, posting a 3.13 ERA with 69 strikeouts versus 18 walks over 77 innings. That is a pitcher you can trade.
The A’s finished 26th in rotation ERA in 2025. The rotation did struggle at home with a 5.52 ERA in Sacramento, so that led to inflated ERAs, but their only two returning starters with more than 100 innings are Jeffrey Springs (4.11 ERA) and Luis Severino (4.54 ERA). It will be difficult for the A’s to lure a decent free agent starter to Sacramento — they had to overpay to sign Severino — so a trade makes sense. Alcantara is signed to a reasonable $17.3 million for 2026 with a $21 million club option for 2027, which even the A’s can afford.
With the Nick Kurtz-led offense, the A’s will score runs. If they can build out the rotation and bullpen, they have the look of 2026’s sleeper playoff team. Their farm system is improved and they have low-salaried pitching depth with guys like Mason Barnett and Jack Perkins to throw back Miami’s way. — David Schoenfield
The Washington Nationals should trade MacKenzie Gore to the Baltimore Orioles
Gore hasn’t quite made the jump to front-line starter. But he has some qualities in common with higher slot lefties who are front-line types, like Blake Snell and Max Fried, so there could be another gear to be teased out. He also comes with two years of control and his arbitration number this year should land around $5 million.
In return, the Orioles can send a prospect package featuring OFs Slater de Brun and Austin Overn and RHPs Esteban Mejia and J.T. Quinn to the Nationals. Baltimore doesn’t have to include C Samuel Basallo and can probably hang onto OF Dylan Beavers, as well. I have the Nats opting for a larger package of players that includes what I think will be the sorts of prospects we’ll see new president of baseball operations Paul Toboni target. It helps new execs coming from the draft side of evaluation to target recent draftees, with de Brun and Quinn from the 2025 draft and Overn from the 2024 draft. — Kiley McDaniel
The Pittsburgh Pirates should trade Mitch Keller to the San Francisco Giants
The Giants churned through 15 starting pitchers in 2025 and return only three who made more than 10 starts (Logan Webb, Robbie Ray and Landen Roupp), leaving two slots to fill aside from the depth that is required in this era. Hayden Birdsong and Carson Whisenhunt are the top internal candidates, but adding a veteran starter for stability looks like an offseason necessity.
Keller is signed for three more years at an AAV of about $18.5 million. His biggest strength has been durability and consistency, making at least 29 starts four seasons in a row and averaging 183 innings and 2.1 WAR the past three seasons. His strikeout rate has declined from 25.5% to 20.0% since 2023, so that’s a minor cause for concern, but moving to the Giants, with better defense behind him and a stellar catcher in Patrick Bailey should help lower his batting average allowed.
Do the Pirates have enough rotation depth to trade Keller? Probably not, but they do have Paul Skenes, Mike Burrows, Braxton Ashcraft, Johan Oviedo and Bubba Chandler, plus Jared Jones returning from injury, so there at least is the makings of an exciting young rotation even without Keller. They need power, however, so the ask from the Giants would be their top prospect, first baseman Bryce Eldridge.
Too steep for the Giants? Perhaps. Eldridge has 35-homer potential and has produced while being very young for his levels, reaching Triple-A in 2025 at just 20 years old. He does have some holes in his game, with a 3-to-1 strikeout-to-walk ratio, he struggled against breaking balls from left-handers, he has below-average speed and his defense at first base is fringy, so he might be a DH with Rafael Devers playing first. The power is real — enough for the Pirates to gamble on and also real enough that he’ll be difficult to pry away from the Giants. — Schoenfield
Inspirational thought of the week:
Hang on to your hopes, my friend
That’s an easy thing to say
But if your hopes should pass away
Simply pretend that you can build them again
Look around
The grass is high
The fields are ripe
It’s the springtime of my life
Seasons change with the scenery
Weavin’ time in a tapestry
Won’t you stop and remember me?
Look around
Leaves are brown
And the sky is a hazy shade of winter
— “Hazy Shade of Winter” by Simon & Garfunkel (or The Bangles, depending on how old you are)
Here at Bottom 10 Headquarters, located behind the bank of telephones used to raise money for the “Free Marty Smith From Oxford” fund, we once again look at the calendar and realize that it is conference championship weekend, which means it’s time for the Bottom 10 to make like Lane Kiffin and run for the exit amid a shower of boos and middle fingers.
The #Bottom10 Selection Committee is currently in session to determine the final 2025 rankings, to be revealed Wednesday morning. pic.twitter.com/WdIvj25gNW
— Ryan McGee (@ESPNMcGee) December 2, 2025
Due to an unprecedented coaching carousel that was so bonkers we’ve renamed it the Coaching Tilt-A-Whirl, the candidates list for this year’s Bottom 10 Selection Committee grew faster than Brian Kelly’s lawyers’ billable hours invoice. The final roster: me, my dad, Captain Morgan (aka my stepdad), Mike Gundy, current Northwest Oklahoma defensive coordinator Jerry Glanville and former Texas State Armadillos head coach Ed “Straight Arrow” Gennero. As our vote began, we were joined by Sam Pittman, who pulled up to our meeting spot, a truck stop behind the Gaylord Texan where the fancy-schmancy CFP committee was gathered, behind the wheel of a shoebox Winnebago blasting Skynyrd and towing a pontoon boat upon which the name “S.S. YESSIR” was airbrushed.
Once again, we leaned on our Bottom 10 FPI formula. No, not the ESPN Football Power Index, but rather the Faux Pas Index. Because everyone loves math.
Teams receive one point for each win, minus one point for each loss, minus one point for each loss of their longest losing streak of the year, plus a minus-10 bonus if that longest losing streak is currently active. We also subtract the number of points they have surrendered on the season from the number of points they scored, subtract or add points based on their season turnover margin and subtract their weakness of schedule (WoS) ranking. If a team fired its head coach, that earns a 50-point subtraction, aka the Randy Edsall Fired Coach Bonus.
Divide all of that by the number of games played, and there’s your Bottom 10 FPI score. Because it’s hard numbers, the results are indisputable. And by hard numbers we mean that we made the formula so badly complicated that it’s too hard to dispute because it’s not worth wasting the effort to do so.
With apologies to Tennessee wide receiver Deon Hardin, Mizzou running back Ahmad Hardy, Rice running back D’Andre Hardeman Jr. and Steve Harvey, here’s the final 2025 Bottom 10 rankings.
Wins: +0
Losses: -12
Longest losing streak: -12 (current -10)
Point differential: -330 (133 for, 463 against)
Turnover margin: -7
WoS: -91
Randy Edsall Fired Coach Bonus: N/A
Total: -450
Games played: 12
Final Bottom 10 Faux Pas Index: -37.5
The Minuetmen had their wet hay in the barn a full week early, having played their final game of the season on the Tuesday afternoon prior to Thanksgiving. Once they got that hay into the barn, they remembered that the Salem witch trials took place in Massachusetts and they immediately burned that barn down in an effort to exorcise their Bottom 10 demons.
Wins: +2
Losses: -10
Longest losing streak: -8
Point differential: -241 (213 for, 454 against)
Turnover margin: +2
WoS: -104
Randy Edsall Fired Coach Bonus: N/A
Total: -359
Games played: 12
Final Bottom 10 Faux Pas Index: -29.9
The Bearkats kompiled a two-win kampaign, but still katapulted kompletely over kontenders who had only one win. How did they akkomplish that? Bekause of a krappy strength of skedule and a defense too frekwently skored upon.
Wins: +1
Losses: -11
Longest losing streak: -11 (current -10)
Point differential: -230 (170 for, 400 against)
Turnover margin: -5
WoS: -30
Randy Edsall Fired Coach Bonus: -50
Total: -346
Games played: 12
Final Bottom 10 Faux Pas Index: -28.8
Many people in the greater Stillwater area had told me that I didn’t have the Kowboys, er, sorry, Cowboys ranked low enough. When we did the FPI math, it backed up those complainers with the same amount of force that it backed down their team.
Wins: +1
Losses: -11
Longest losing streak: -9 (current -10)
Point differential: -217 (237 for, 454 against)
Turnover margin: -11
WoS: -66
Randy Edsall Fired Coach Bonus: N/A
Total: -323
Games played: 12
Final Bottom 10 Faux Pas Index: -26.9
Just as the arithmetic hurt OSU, it helped GSU, which jumped/fell from No. 2 to No. 4. That might not seem like much, but for a team that last won a game more than 80 days ago, you’ll take whatever good news you can get.
5. The Lane Train
Marty said if I didn’t have Kiffin in the Coveted Fifth Spot again this week he would beat me over the head with the turkey leg he wasn’t able to eat with his family on Thanksgiving because he had to go to Oxford and hold a microphone instead.
Wins: +2
Losses: -10
Longest losing streak: -6 (current -10)
Point differential: -148 (222 for, 370 against)
Turnover margin: -4
WoS: -90
Randy Edsall Fired Coach Bonus: -50
Total: -316
Games played: 12
Final Bottom 10 Faux Pas Index: -26.3
Easily, the most vocal “How can we not be ranked?!” #Bottom10Lobbying crowd of 2025 was Rams Nation. And when we did the math, they were proved right as Colorado State leapt like a ram from a rock formation off the Waiting List into the canyon of nearly the top/bottom five. Now they have hired professional Bottom 10 rehabilitation specialist Jim Mora, who totally ruined what used to be the Bottom 10’s version of Chiefs vs. Eagles, UMess vs. U-Can’t, by inexplicably turning the Huskies into winners.
Wins: +1
Losses: -11
Longest losing streak: -9 (current -10)
Point differential: -264 (172 for, 436 against)
Turnover margin: -8
WoS: -70
Randy Edsall Fired Coach Bonus: N/A
Total: -271
Games played: 12
Final Bottom 10 Faux Pas Index: -22.5833333
Niners officials reached out to the Bottom 10 committee to see if perhaps they might receive bonus cool points for the fact that their record was 1-9 when Georgia paid them $1.9 million to play “between the hedges.” We told them no, but only after reaching out to UNCC math professors, who assured us that the laws of natural numerical law would not allow us to add something called “cool points” to something called a “Faux Pas Index.” Speaking of math, Charlotte also is now part of a Bottom 10 FPI first, a numerical tie! With whom … ?
Wins: +2
Losses: -10
Longest losing streak: -7
Point differential: -135 (218 for, 353 against)
Turnover margin: -11
WoS: -60
Randy Edsall Fired Coach Bonus: -50
Total: -271
Games played: 12
Final Bottom 10 Faux Pas Index: -22.5833333
It should be no surprise that the Beavers would be in some weird spot here after spending their entire season stuck in a bizarro Bottom 10 vortex. They won the tiebreaker with Charlotte via one common opponent, Appalachian State. The Niners lost at home to the Mountaineers 34-11, while the Beavs lost in Boone by only four points. One of only a pair of members of the 2Pac conference, Oregon State had already beaten its only league colleague, Warshington State, in Week 10, but then immediately lost to Sam Houston. Then all the Beavers had to do was beat Wazzu again to depart these rankings for good, but they lost 32-8. Now they will do like all beavers and spend the winter not hibernating, but packed into a mud lodge with other beavers, shivering and seeing who has to swim out under the ice to get food. In related news, that’s also how we on the Bottom 10 Selection Committee spent this week. We sent Mike Gundy out to get the food because his haircut totally looks like a beaver.
Wins: +2
Losses: -10
Longest losing streak: -5 (current -10)
Point differential: -85 (280 for, 365 against)
Turnover margin: -12
WoS: -109
Randy Edsall Fired Coach Bonus: N/A
Total: -229
Games played: 12
Final Bottom 10 Faux Pas Index: -19.1
Representatives of the Minors crashed our committee meeting to remind us that while they understood they would likely have to be ranked, no matter what the math said, they had to be ranked above/below Sam Houston because they beat the Bearkats head-to-head. But we didn’t hear any of that because when we say they crashed our meeting, they literally crashed our meeting. Paydirt Pete had to use his pickax to pry the UTEP conversion van free from where it ran into the trailer carrying Pittman’s pontoon boat.
Wins: +2
Losses: -10
Longest losing streak: -10
Point differential: -88 (305 for, 393 against)
Turnover margin: -9
WoS: -54
Randy Edsall Fired Coach Bonus: N/A
Total: -169
Games played: 12
Final Bottom 10 Faux Pas Index: -14.08
The Golden Beagles were in a Bottom 10 peloton to the finish line, which was more like that scene at Oklahoma a few weeks ago when the Sooners got lost in the smoke of their stadium entrance and fell over each other, piling up like firewood for winter. In the end, Arkansaw and Pur-don’t received too big of a Power 4 WoS boost, while Muddled Tennessee and No-vada both had the audacity to win two out of their final three games, hitting the Raise Hell Praise Dale 3-victory mark and moving out of the running. We started to do the FPI math on a few other teams, but when the batteries ran out in our Texas Instruments calculator, Coach Pittman, relieved his former Hogs missed the final cut, announced, “I’ll go to the store, but it won’t be to buy batteries. It’ll be to buy beer.” Meeting adjourned.
Waiting List: Arkansaw Fightin’ Former Petrinos, No-vada, San No-sé State, Pur-don’t, Muddled Tennessee State, Northern Ill-ugh-noise, ULM (pronounced “Uhlm”), conference tiebreakers that require slide rules.
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