2016 Heisman Finalists Stats

The 2016 Heisman Trophy race has the potential to be among the best in college football history. The 2015 winner, Derrick Henry, is gone, but four of the next five vote-getters from last season -- Christian McCaffrey, Deshaun Watson, Baker Mayfield and Leonard Fournette -- return. How do these front-runners stack up? With the help of some advanced stats, we look ahead to this star-studded season by taking a look back at these four players' success in 2015.

The five finalists for the 2016 Heisman Trophy are set. They’ll be heading to New York on Friday to take part in all the festivities surrounding the announcement of the 82nd annual award. Here are a few items of note about Heisman finalist lore for all you trophy aficionados out there: — There have been. Dec 24, 2020 Heisman Trophy finalists 2020: Mac Jones, Trevor Lawrence, DeVonta Smith, Kyle Trask make cut to win award These four finalists will take part in a virtual Heisman Trophy ceremony on Tuesday, Jan. The Heisman finalists consist of three productive quarterbacks, a big-play receiver and a versatile defender. Here are their key stats to know. Dec 10, 2016 Louisville quarterback Lamar Jackson is the first Heisman Trophy winner in his school’s history, beating out Clemson’s Deshaun Watson for this year's award.Jackson was announced as 2016’s. 2016 Heisman Trophy finalists announced Lamar Jackson, Deshaun Watson among Heisman Trophy finalists Lamar Jackson and Deshaun Watson headline the Heisman Trophy finalists.

Expected Points Added accounts for the game situation (down, distance, yard line) to determine how much a team, player or unit contributes to its net scoring margin on every play. An individual player's Total EPA is the sum of the EPA on plays he is directly involved in (passes, rushes, receptions, returns, etc.)

Quarterback Points Added measures the total production of a quarterback compared with what an average quarterback (average = QBR of 50) would be expected to have, taking into account efficiency, usage and level of competition.

Comparing the RBs

The Heisman Trophy is a stat-driven award, but looking only at yards and touchdowns is an incomplete representation of a player's impact. The problem with traditional stats is they don't account for when those stats are compiled (a 5-yard gain on second-and-5 is different from one on third-and-10) or how they impact a team's success. By accounting for game situation, expected points added provides a truer representation of a running back's overall impact on the game. No running back had a greater impact last season than Stanford's Christian McCaffrey, whose plays (rushing, receiving and returns) contributed 112 points to Stanford's net scoring margin -- that's about 20 percent more than any other player in the country!

McCaffrey broke Barry Sanders' record for all-purpose yards in a season (3,864), so while his rushing numbers may not stack up with those of Leonard Fournette or Derrick Henry, his overall impact was unmatched. In terms of EPA, McCaffrey's plays added 48 points on the ground, 45 through the air and 19 on returns. No other player has had that large of a single-season impact in each phase of the game since 2005.

Comparing the QBs

LSU

QB points added measures the total production of a quarterback compared with what an average quarterback (average = QBR of 50) would be expected to have, taking into account efficiency, usage and level of competition. By this measure, no quarterback came close to adding more total value to his team last season than Deshaun Watson, who added 134 more points than an average QB would have with the same number of plays. Where does Baker Mayfield stack up? His 78 QB points added ranked 11th overall and is the fourth-highest mark among returning QBs.

How does Watson's 2015 campaign match up against other all-time great single seasons? When compared to Heisman-winning QBs over the past 10 seasons, Watson had the fourth-most points added and provided more total value than Cam Newton, Tim Tebow and Jameis Winston in their Heisman-winning seasons. Amazingly, all signs point to Watson having an even more efficient and impactful season in 2016. No wonder he enters as the Heisman front-runner.

A linebacker is among the 2016 Heisman Trophy finalists, but a running back is not. That is among the storylines heading into Saturday’s ceremony (8 p.m. ET, ESPN/WatchESPN).

Record-setting season for Louisville’s Jackson

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Lamar Jackson passed for 3,390 yards and 30 touchdowns with nine interceptions. The sophomore was valuable running the ball, too, accumulating 1,538 yards and 21 touchdowns on the ground.

Jackson was the third player in FBS history to record 30 pass touchdowns and rush for 20 more in one season. The other two players (Cam Newton and Tim Tebow) won the Heisman.

Among the ACC records Jackson set were the single-season mark for touchdown responsibility (51) and the single-game total offense record (610 yards in Week 2 against Syracuse).

Lamar Jackson*

No player from Louisville has won the Heisman. The only top-10 finisher in school history is Elvis Dumervil, who finished 10th in 2005.

If Jackson wins, he will be the youngest Heisman Trophy winner. Born Jan. 7, 1997, Jackson will be 19 years, 337 days old Saturday -- five days younger than Jameis Winston at the time of his win.

Before the season, Jackson’s odds to win the Heisman were 100-1 (a winning $1 bet would produce $100), according to Westgate Las Vegas. When Heisman odds closed in mid-November, Jackson’s odds were 1-50 (it would take a $5,000 bet to win $100).

Mayfield productive, efficient

Oklahoma’s Baker Mayfield passed for 3,669 yards and 38 touchdowns with eight interceptions. He rushed for six TDs.

After last week’s games, he is the FBS leader in Total QBR (91.6), completion percentage (71.2 percent) and yards per attempt (11.1). The last player to finish a season in the top three in the FBS in each of those categories was Wisconsin’s Russell Wilson in 2011.

Mayfield finished fourth in the Heisman voting last season. This season, he has a better completion percentage, more touchdown passes and a higher Total QBR than he did last season.

Can Watson improve on last season’s showing?

Clemson’s Deshaun Watson passed for 3,914 yards and 37 touchdowns (both tops in the ACC this season) with 15 interceptions. He rushed for 529 yards and six TDs.

On Thursday, Watson won the Davey O’Brien Award for the second time. He’s the fourth two-time winner of the award, and each of the other three also won the Heisman Trophy in one of the seasons he won the O’Brien.

Last season, Watson finished third in Heisman voting, the best finish by a Clemson player. This year he looks to top that with the school’s first Heisman Trophy.

Should Watson and Jackson finish first and second in the Heisman voting, it would be the first time since 2008 and the seventh time in Heisman history that the winner and runner-up came from the same conference (Sam Bradford and Colt McCoy from the Big 12 were the most recent to do it).

Oklahoma’s Westbrook specializes in big plays

Dede Westbrook had 74 catches for 1,465 yards and a school-record 16 touchdowns. He also scored a touchdown on a punt return. His receiving yards, receiving touchdowns and yards after the catch (704) led the Big 12.

The Oklahoma senior, who won the Biletnikoff Award on Thursday, led Power 5 receivers in 20-yard receptions with 26 and in 100-yard receiving games with eight.

Peppers: versatile and valuable

Heisman Finalists: Lamar Jackson, Jabrill Peppers, Deshaun ...

Michigan sophomore linebacker Jabrill Peppers could become the second primarily defensive player to win the Heisman (Charles Woodson, also of Michigan, won in 1997). Only six defensive players have finished in the top three of Heisman voting.

Peppers took at least 10 snaps at linebacker, defensive back, quarterback, running back and wide receiver. He has 72 tackles, including 16 tackles for a lost, with four sacks and an interception.

He has rushed for three touchdowns and returned a punt for a touchdown -- the same number of touchdowns Woodson scored by those means in his Heisman season.

Peppers is the first defensive player invited to the Heisman ceremony since Notre Dame’s Manti Te’o in 2012.

Joe Burrow*

When Heisman odds closed Nov. 17, Peppers was the second favorite to Jackson at 15-1.

2016 Heisman Finalists Stats 2019

Did you know?

This is the sixth time a running back will not finish in the top five of Heisman voting -- but the third time in the past five years.