Voters get bored quickly and don’t often give Heisman trophies to the same player more than once. In fact, Archie Griffin is the only one to get it twice, back-to-back. Johnny Manziel might not be leading Texas A&M to a national championship, but there’s no reason to ignore he’s the best player in College Football.
It’s nice getting SMU as an opponents after playing Alabama. Manziel was lights out against the Crimson Tide, but there’s a limit as to how much he can do by himself. He led A&M to a 42-13 demolition of the Mustangs, getting back on track to try and keep up with the rest of the undefeated teams in the SEC, hoping that an early loss won’t mean as much by the end of the year.
Manziel finished with one touchdown throw and a couple of more on the ground, but he did turnover the ball once in what turned out to be insignificant. Texas A&M had a good enough defense on the day to handle SMU’s running game and allowing them to score their only touchdown of the game late in the fourth quarter. The Aggies’ defense might not be good enough to slow down Alabama, but it isn’t as bad as those 49 points might suggest.
Manziel has now thrown or rushed for a TD in each of his last 10 games. The last game in which Manziel wasn’t responsible for at least 1 score was Oct. 20, 2012 vs LSU, one of the Aggies’ two losses last season. With him orchestrating the offense, they’ve scored at least 42 points in four straight games to open the season (3-1), the 1st time in program history they’ve been on such a scoring streak.
He’s an amazing player. You blitz him and he’s accurate with the ball. You rush three, and he can scramble around and make it last forever. He’s a great college football player and he’s in the perfect system.
While it does raise questions about how successful Manziel can be in the pros, there’s still time for that. He has his inaccuracy issues to work on, but it’s hard to ask for anyone better or more resilient to run an offense. Kevin Sumlin knows all he has to do is take care of the offensive line and the defense to take it up a notch so Manziel’s incredible efforts, week after week, aren’t in vain.
In the first couple, three weeks there were a lot of moving parts and guys out there just worrying about doing their job, not being able to communicate. There’s definitely a comfort factor with having all your pieces back and being able to not only play that play but also make adjustments as the game moves on.
There’s no point in wallowing about the loss of a national championship due to that loss against Alabama. Early losses mean less in the end due to the human factor in the BCS formula, and Texas A&M simply need their defense to be in the best of shape it can be when the SEC grind begins, so they’ll be around when Alabama and others take a tumble.