After historic season at LSU, Joe Burrow poised to shatter Heisman record

LSU Tigers quarterback Joe Burrow is going to win the Heisman. The only question is whether he sets the record for the biggest win in Heisman history.

The Heisman Trophy ceremony on Saturday night in New York will undoubtedly be Joe Burrow‘s party. But the LSU quarterback won’t be alone, and the number of players joining him at the ceremony is another indication of what we already know.

He’s going to win. Big.

Burrow headlines a group of four finalists that were announced Monday night, as he’ll be joined by Ohio State’s Justin Fields and Chase Young and Oklahoma’s Jalen Hurts.

This marks the 11th time there have been four invitees, a field that has produced a typical margin of victory of 1,199 points. That’s the highest average of any field since they began inviting players to the proceedings in 1982, besting groups of three players (746 points), five (542) and six (1,173).

In 1991, when Desmond Howard beat Casey Weldon by 1,574 points — the fourth-highest gap between the first-and second-place finishers — it was in a four-player field. The same in ’98, as Ricky Williams won by 1,563 points over Michael Bishop in the fifth-largest margin of victory and 2010, when 1,184 points separated Cam Newton and Andrew Luck.

Those Newton and Williams votes may give us the best roadmaps to what to expect this weekend, though each does have its flaws in using them as comparisons.

The Texas running back has the largest percentage of possible points (85.2 percent) in a four-player finalist field and the second-most first-place votes at 714, but his team was nowhere near as accomplished as Burrow’s. That Longhorns squad had three regular-season losses and dropped two of its four meetings with top-10 opponents; Burrow and the Tigers have won five such games.

The record for most first-places with four players at the ceremony is held by Newton, and the Auburn quarterback would likely be our best comparison for Burrow overall, if not for the pay-for-play scandal that kept him off 105 ballots. The way Newton elevated those Tigers and had them playing for a national championship is every bit the impact Burrow has had … but we’ll never known how big a margin of victory Newton could have won by had the scandal not hung over him.

There’s also another correlation with that Newton season in this year’s finalists. Along with Luck, LaMichael James and Kellen Moore were also at the ceremony, with the former having missed a game for Oregon due to a suspension. He was the last player to earn an invite despite having to sit out a game, that is until Young, who made it for the Buckeyes despite missing two weeks for an NCAA violation.

In that vote, James had the lowest number of first-places, and Young — the first defensive lineman at the ceremony since Ndamukong Suh in 2009 — is also likely to be docked by some voters for that missed time. But unlike that year, Young is also joined by his quarterback in Fields, making this the first time ever that a single team has had a finalist come from both sides of the ball.

With a clear favorite in this field, it’s hard not to see those Buckeyes steal each other’s votes for those second and third spots on ballots, and with running back J.K. Dobbins also likely appearing in the top eight, Ohio State’s embarrassment of riches with stars only hurt their chance to have weight behind a single candidate.

Then there’s Hurts, who has the numbers — he’s tied for the FBS lead with Burrow with 308 points responsible for and is third in total offense at 376.1 yards per game — and a College Football Playoff spot opposite LSU, but like everyone else playing from behind as Burrow dominated the season and it’s all setting itself up to be a vote like no other.

The Tigers quarterback is headed for a sure win, with Fields likely at No. 2, followed by Hurts and Young.

Here’s what to look for within the voting numbers themselves:

With 970 voters — this writer included — there are not enough available points to make a charge at O.J. Simpson‘s 2,853 points, set back in 1968 when there were 1,042 ballots, but the expectation here is that we’re going to see history nonetheless.

Burrow will challenge Marcus Mariota‘s 2014 record of appearing on 95.16 percent of ballots and Troy Smith‘s ’06 mark of 91.63 possible points (though that record is actually 91.7 percent, set by Reggie Bush in his since-vacated 2005 win) and has a shot at two of Simpson’s marks, for the most first-place votes (855) and the largest margin of victory at 1,750 points.

Burrow should claim 800-plus first-place votes and over 2,600 points and a margin of victory of 1,700 points, making it the biggest total in either category in the era of finalists.

The drama had been sucked out of this race for the past month, a testament to both Burrow’s transcendent season and his lack of a true rival. The chance of a record finish, though, is going to make a foregone conclusion simply riveting.

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