The 2022 Heisman Trophy ceremony was held Saturday night in New York, where USC quarterback Caleb Williams won the prestigious award over TCU QB Max Duggan, Ohio State QB C.J. Stroud and Georgia QB Stetson Bennett IV.
Tennessee senior quarterback Hendon Hooker was not invited to the ceremony, as he finished fifth in voting, and only the top four go to New York.
While Hooker was not in the spotlight on Saturday, his name did not go without mention. After Williams’ acceptance speech, the program concluded with ESPN’s Chris Fowler sharing the official results of the voting. In doing this, Fowler mentioned Hooker won the Nissan Fan Vote for the 2022 Heisman Trophy.
#Vols QB Hendon Hooker was the Fan Vote winner for the 2022 Heisman Trophy.
— Jack Foster (@jackfostermedia) December 11, 2022
There has been a significant amount of uproar from Tennessee fans and college football personalities regarding Hooker’s Heisman snub.
More From RTI: Where Hendon Hooker Landed in Heisman Voting
Hooker was magnificent in Tennessee’s first 10-win regular season since 2003. Hooker threw for 3,135 yards, 27 touchdowns and only two interceptions, a mark that was tied for the lowest amount among FBS starting quarterbacks. Hooker also finished the year second in the FBS in passing efficiency, also known as passer rating, with a 175.51 efficiency rating.
The Greensboro, North Carolina, native had arguably the best ‘Heisman moment’ of any college football player this season when he led the Vols to a 52-49 win over (then) No. 3 Alabama in Neyland Stadium. Hooker threw for 385 yards and a staggering five touchdowns against Nick Saban’s defense, capping off his performance with back-to-back completions to get Tennessee in field-goal range. Tennessee kicker Chase McGrath took care of the rest, making a 40-yard field goal to win the game in what was an instant classic.
The most likely reason Hooker did not make the cut as a Heisman finalist is his injury in the Vols’ 63-38 loss to South Carolina in Columbia in mid-November. The night was nothing short of a nightmare for Tennessee Football and ended with the star quarterback sustaining a torn ACL. The game was Tennessee’s penultimate contest of the regular season, so Hooker only missed one game during the season.
Outside of South Carolina, Hooker’s lone subpar game was against No. 1 Georgia’s daunting defense.
Hooker’s elite performance against Alabama, domination against Florida and Kentucky, and ability to win an early-season overtime battle against Pitt made the Tennessee signal caller certainly deserving of a New York invite. College football fans felt that Hooker not only deserved an invite to New York, but that he also deserved the trophy itself.
Hooker received 40 percent of the fan vote, beating out the quartet of finalists Williams, Duggan, Stroud and Bennett.
3 Responses
Seen this same Rediculously bad snub too many times before re. the Tennessee vols greatest players. My personal opinion is “THIS ONE” was, and is just as pathetic as Peyton ‘s. Snub. Voters are NOWHERE near accurate and UNAQUIVICABLY biased. HOPE Hendon recovers to RULE the NFL. GBO
1st I like thank Hendon Hooker for becoming a VFL enjoyed watching him run this high powered offense. He should have been 1 invited he had over 3100 yds passing 27 TDs with 89.4 QBR which is 2nd highest in nation he also had over 430 yds rushing with 4.1 yd run average and 5 TDS on ground. Those rushing stats included 23 sacks which subtracts from his rushing yds. I think him not even being invited was about as insulting as when they gave Charles Woodson trophy over Peyton Manning.
Popularity vote among the media and former Heisman winners that can use feelings, stats, flip a coin, etc. See below from Heisman website. Understand, rarely is it ALL about actual numbers but popularity of the moment, not even the season.
Congrats to all representing the SEC in the awards and all the other SEC representing in bowl games. GoVols
Decided that sports journalists were the most logical group for this task. As informed, competent and impartial observers, they comprise the vast majority of the electors. The Heisman Trophy Trust governs the policies and procedures by which the balloting process is conducted. Specifically, six persons are chosen as Sectional Representatives.
The Sectional Representatives are responsible for the appointment of the State Representatives. State Representatives are given the responsibility of selecting the voters within their particular state. The amount of votes that a particular state is allotted depends on the size of the state and the amount of media outlets within that state. Larger states such as California and Texas will naturally have more votes than smaller states such as Vermont and Delaware.
The states are divided into the six sections accordingly:
Far West: AZ, CA, HI, ID, MT, ND, NV, OR, SD, UT, WA, WY
Mid Atlantic: DC, DE, MD, NC, NJ, PA, SC, VA, WV
Mid West: IA, IL, IN, MI, MN, OH, WI
North East: CT, MA, ME, NH, NYC, NY, RI, VT
South: AL, FL, GA, KY, LA, MS, TN
Southwest: AR, CO, KS, MO, NE, NM, OK, TX
Each Section within the United States has 145 media votes, totaling 870 media votes across the country. Additionally every former Heisman winner, 57 presently, has a vote as well. In 1999, The Heisman Trophy agreed to develop a special program to allow the public at large to become part of the balloting process by permitting one (1) fan vote eligible in the overall tabulation. This program once again continued this past season through a partnership with Nissan North America, bringing the total number of voters for the 2021 Heisman race to 928.