Heisman race, BCS matchup products of media's self-fulfilling prophecy

Hate Mail: Here's a prediction

These past four months were a complete waste of time. The 2009 college football season? It was superfluous. Unnecessary.

Back in August, if not earlier, the media foretold the 2009 season. We told you who would play for the national championship, and we told you who would be the serious candidates for the Heisman Trophy, and then -- dammit -- we made it happen.

Kellen Moore threw 39 TD passes with just three picks for a 13-0 Boise State team. Nah, he's no Heisman candidate. (US Presswire)

Never mind that we were wrong in August. Never mind that we didn't see Cincinnati coming, or Texas Christian, or Boise State. We saw Texas or Oklahoma playing Alabama or Florida in the BCS title game. So it was written, and so it was.

The same goes for the Heisman. As soon as all three finalists from last season announced they were coming back for 2009, we decided they would be the most serious contenders again. It was obvious, after all. Oklahoma's Sam Bradford won, and he was back. Florida's Tim Tebow and Texas' Colt McCoy almost won, and they were also back. That would be your top three this season, and if anyone insisted on injecting a slice of fresh meat into the conversation, fine. We'd scan the roster of the other best team in the country -- like we told you, that team was Alabama -- and we'd pick someone from the Crimson Tide. We settled on Mark Ingram. If he had a good season, he'd be a finalist, too.

So it was written, and so it was.

It's embarrassing. We turned the 2009 football season into a self-fulfilling prophecy by determining before the season began who should get the biggest team and individual awards, and then by refusing to consider other alternatives as the season unfolded.

I don't know why I'm so angry, but I am. It's not like this is news. The gaseous media likes the smell of its own hot air? Good Lord, I already knew that. Most people, and sportswriters are no different, prefer not to think outside the box. They don't want to even consider the possibility of life outside the box. Put me in a box and I feel claustrophobic, but put them in a box and they feel safe. Protected. There is structure inside that box, and structure matters for a group of people who see possibilities in only one shade -- the same shade as the slacks most of these people wear: beige.

That's the 2009 BCS national title game. It's beige. Alabama clearly belongs, and I won't suggest otherwise, but you know what Texas is? Texas is a boring pair of khaki pants.

Texas Christian beat the crap out of everybody it played, and Cincinnati beat more Top 25 teams than Texas, and Boise State beat the highest-ranked opponent of the bunch (No. 7 Oregon), but those teams are unconventional. TCU is a pair of horn-rimmed eyeglasses, and Cincinnati is a funky shirt with a wide lapel, and Boise State is a camel-hair blazer that's just out there -- and the media doesn't relate to things that are out there. So the media will stick with what it knows. And the media knows Texas, which is why Texas is in the BCS title game despite having probably the fifth-best résumé in the country.

And when the Heisman is awarded this weekend, the anointed quartet, minus the injured Bradford, will be there. Colt McCoy was pretty good this season, then absolutely horrific in the Big 12 title game, and somehow pretty good plus absolutely horrific equals a Heisman finalist. Tim Tebow was nothing special in more than half of his team's 13 games. Check out his stats. They're nothing special. But he'll be in New York as well. And Mark Ingram? He's not the best running back in the South (that would be C.J. Spiller of Clemson), or even the SEC (Dexter McCluster of Ole Miss). But he's going because he's the most famous player on the most famous team. He's Gino Torretta.

Neither Spiller nor McCluster is going to New York, of course. Ingram will go, and probably even win, because voters are idiots. Simple as that. Mark Ingram's serious Heisman candidacy confirms that voters are idiots. Hell, Mark Ingram wasn't as good this season as the true freshman running back at Pittsburgh, Dion Lewis, who had more carries, yards and touchdowns. And Lewis won't finish in the Heisman Top 10. If he's in the top 20, I'll be shocked.

Maybe you think I'm giving the media too much credit for the scummy residue on this college football season, but I'm not. The media poll doesn't contribute to the BCS formula, true, but the media poll sets the tone, and the BCS-approved coaches poll mostly follows it. The media poll went into this season with Florida first, followed by No. 2 Texas and No. 5 Alabama. Boise State was No. 14. TCU was No. 17. Cincinnati was unranked. Assuming all six teams went undefeated -- which they did, until the SEC title game -- the bottom three had no chance of surpassing the top three. Sad but true, and I offer the coaches' poll as proof.

And the Harris Poll is an absolute joke, copying the coaches' poll week after week after week. So the media pulled out of the BCS but we control it anyway. Lovely. Coaches are too busy to think for themselves, and Harris voters are so damn pleased to be part of the process, they'll do anything to stay involved. And that means doing nothing that might draw attention. So if everyone else says Alabama and Texas and Florida are the top three teams in the country, who are Harris voters to argue? Who are Harris voters, anyway?

The Heisman situation is even worse. Week by week, McCoy and Tebow and Ingram put up modest numbers, and week by week that trio stayed near the top of most of the most prominent Heisman lists online. And you can imagine where the typical voter goes for Heisman information: to the most prominent Heisman lists online. Maybe a maverick voter here or there will substitute a new name into the Chosen Trio -- They have Ingram, McCoy and Tebow; I'll put McCoy ahead of Ingram, and add Toby Gerhart -- but by and large, the names are the same. And we have the NYC invitation list to prove it.

Prediction: Lots of college football voter-types will read this story, and a bunch of them will look up Dion Lewis or Dexter McCluster, because until I wrote those names, lots of voters had no idea how good those guys were this season. You've already looked, voters, haven't you? Good. And look up Boise State quarterback Kellen Moore while you're at it. He had a better year than one Colt McCoy, and he had a better year than two of Tim Tebow.

But Kellen Moore didn't fit into the media's narrative for 2009. We knew how the season would start, and we knew how it would end.

All that stuff in the middle? Details. Pointless details.