Heisman Watch 2022: USC’s Caleb Williams threat to make history in transfer portal era

Transfers have won the Heisman Trophy before, but USC quarterback Caleb Williams is among the threats to break through in a new period of player movement.

The free-agent frenzy of the transfer portal era has without question changed the college football landscape, and if the early results are any indication, it figures to heavily influence this year’s Heisman Trophy race.

Of the 65 Power Five teams, 32 have quarterbacks that started their careers elsewhere, including 19 of whom were first-year transfers. There may not be a more compelling case among them, and one better positioned to deliver the first trophy of this period of constant player movement than USC’s Caleb Williams.

Coming over from Oklahoma — along with his coach Lincoln Riley — Williams has thrown for 590 yards, six touchdowns and no interceptions and ran for another 72 yards. His 79.6 completion percentage tops all Power Five players and Williams’ 221.14 rating is second.

Williams’ situation is truly unlike any player since the advent of first-time transfers not having to sit out a year, following his coach who also bolted Norman for sunny California. We saw what Williams was capable of last season when he threw for 1,912 yards and 21 touchdowns and ran for another 442 yards and six scores.

He’s simply continuing that level of play in a system he was already comfortable in, and doing so with some new toys, like reigning Biletnikoff Award winner Jordan Addison, who Williams has already hit 12 times for 226 yards and four touchdowns.

Now second in the odds at +300 per BetMGM, situating him between Ohio State’s C.J. Stroud (+275) and the defending winner, Alabama’s Bryce Young (+400), Williams is one of only three players currently better than +1400. The next-closest first-year transfer is Dillon Gabriel (+2500), the guy now playing Williams’ old position at his old school. Meanwhile, Jaxson Dart (Ole Miss), Quinn Ewers (Texas) Spencer Rattler (South Carolina) and Kedon Slovis (Pitt) have also generated their own buzz as fellow new faces in new places.

We’ve become numb to transfers, but even when they were more of a novelty, they still claimed their share of Heismans, dating all the way back to 1945.

One half of the fabled Mr. Inside, Mr. Outside backfield, Doc Blanchard (Mr. Inside), was originally at North Carolina, but enlisted in the Army in 1943 and landed at West Point, where he was third in the voting in 1944 before becoming the first junior to win.

Blanchard was the first player to go directly from one Division-I/FBS school to the next — but because freshmen couldn’t play at the time, he never suited up for the Tar Heels — and wouldn’t happen again until Baker Mayfield in 2017, with Kyler Murray (2018) to follow. Both of those Sooners quarterbacks, though, had to sit out a year as was the requirement at the time.

Junior college transfers have collected trophies as well, with O.J. Simpson (1968), Mike Rozier (1983) and Cam Newton (2010). And in 2019, Joe Burrow became the first graduate transfer to claim the trophy when he went from Ohio State to LSU.

Now we wait on the next piece of Heisman history when it comes to transfers, as the first to use the transfer portal to go from one major program one season to another the next.

William’s hype in doing so isn’t likely to slow down over the seventh-ranked Trojans’ next four games, which has three defenses that are 65th or lower vs. the pass, including Washington State (70th) and Oregon State (108th), and doesn’t look to present a true test until Oct. 15 vs. No. 14 Utah.

He’s a threat and has a place in this voter’s virtual ballot, which we’ll be updating each week.

1. C.J. Stroud, Ohio State
2. Bryce Young, Alabama
3. Caleb Williams, USC

Heisman stock watch: Which candidates are heating up, which are falling off?

BUY: Will Levis, Kentucky

Remember last week when this space touted all those SEC East contenders like Stetson Bennett IV (Georgia), Hendon Hooker (Tennessee) and Anthony Richardson (Florida)?

Yeah … sorry about that, Will Levis.

He got the best of his Gators counterpart, hitting on 13 of his 24 passes for 202 yards, including a 55-yard touchdown pass to Dane Key in the second quarter, in helping to vault the Wildcats to No. 9 in The Associated Press Top 25 and 10th in the Coaches Poll. It’s the first time they’ve been ranked in the top 10 in both polls since 2007, and the earliest Kentucky has had a top-10 team since 1965.

The Wildcats haven’t had a player finish in the top 10 in voting since Tim Couch was fourth in 1998, and now Levis has our attention. He’s got time to build on it with Youngstown State and Northern Illinois before an Oct. 1 trip to No. 20 Ole Miss.

SELL: Bryce Young, Alabama

He looked … mortal. Bryce Young wasn’t alone in the Alabama-Texas game when it came to contenders who didn’t exactly look strike-the-pose worthy. Crimson Tide linebacker Will Anderson Jr. had four costly penalties to go with his five tackles; Texas’ Bijan Robinson had a mere 57 yards on 21 carries, and his teammate Quinn Ewers suffered a clavicle sprain and will miss the next four-to-six weeks.

In his defense, Young got little help from his offensive line or his receivers and ultimately put the Crimson Tide in position to win, orchestrating a fourth-quarter touchdown drive, as well as the go-ahead field goal with 10 seconds left. But the fact remains that as the defending winner, Young is held to a higher standard.

He’ll no doubt carve up UL Monroe this week, and Vanderbilt the next, and with 408 passing yards through two games, we are still waiting for Young’s first monster game of the season.

BUY: Chase Brown, Illinois

The nation’s leading rusher is worth a look here … but the “buy” may status could be short-lived.

Coming off a 1,000-yard season as a sophomore, Chase Brown is well on his way to another, leading FBS with at least 496 yards through three games. That’s the fifth-highest total for a Power-5 player at this point in the season since 2016.

Three of four players ahead of Brown on that yardage list through this point of the season — Stanford’s Bryce Young in 2017, Wisconsin’s Jonathan Taylor in 2018 and Oklahoma State’s Chubba Hubbard in 2019 — all finished in the top 10 in voting.

Brown’s off to a similarly hot start, which could continue this week vs. Chattanooga, but after that, the Illini will have three straight vs. some seriously stout defenses. Wisconsin is yielding 55 yards per game on the ground, Iowa is allowing 81 and Minnesota 36.5.

SELL: Anthony Richardson, Florida

Young is the only SEC player with better odds than Anthony Richardson, but it’s honestly hard to get a true read on the Florida quarterback at this point.

That game-changing athleticism he put on display in knocking off Utah was absent in the loss to Kentucky. Richardson threw two interceptions on 14 of 35 passing totaling 143 yards and ran just six times for four yards after rushing for 106 in the opener.

He’s already lost one head-to-head matchup with a trophy contender in the SEC East, and another looms on Sept. 24 in Knoxville vs. Hooker and Tennessee. That matchup figures to determine how much longer we’ll be talking about the Gators sophomore, but before that, Richardson gets a tuneup vs. South Florida, which gave up 573 yards to BYU in Week 1.

BUY: Hendon Hooker, Tennessee

It’s not a question as to whether Hendon Hooker can put up Heisman-level numbers in Josh Heupel’s offense. His candidacy comes down to whether the Volunteers can back him up with the kind of wins he’ll need to rise in a loaded group of SEC hopefuls.

So far, so good, as Hooker delivered again in last week’s win over Pitt, throwing for 325 yards and two touchdowns, including the go-ahead score in overtime. The Virginia Tech transfer has thrown for 546 yards and four touchdowns without an interception, and also has two scores on the ground. Going back to Sept. 25 of last season, Hooker’s last 10 games he’s passed for 3,099 yards, 30 touchdowns and two interceptions.

Hooker won’t be tested this week vs. Akron, but the three-game stretch to follow will be much more telling, with No. 18 Florida, LSU and No. 2 Alabama to follow.

SELL: Braelon Allen, Wisconsin

A funny thing happened on the way to next week’s showdown with No. 3 Ohio State in Columbus: Braelon Allen was contained in a loss to Washington State, which was 79th vs. the rush last season and allowed over 300 yards twice. The sophomore had 98 yards on 21 carries (that after 148 yards in the opener) and kept out of the end zone after reaching paydirt twice in Week 1.

He’ll probably have a massive day Saturday vs. New Mexico State, which is allowing 194.6 yards per game (112th) through three games, but the Cougars are the kind of defense Allen should have feasted on. His candidacy isn’t trending in the right direction with the Buckeyes looming.

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