LSU QB Jayden Daniels wins Heisman Trophy: Analysis of Tigers' third winner

The Heisman Trophy is the most important individual award in sports. We’re told that a lot each season, especially this time of the year.

Is that true? I’m not so sure. After all, a Super Bowl MVP is important and impressive as are an NBA Finals MVP, a World Series MVP or a Conn Smythe Trophy winner (that's hockey if you don't know). It depends on your perspective and the sport you love the most (or maybe just the one you’re focusing on right now. One hint: I care about all of them because I’m a sports junky or sports nerd, you choose).

But for those of us in the college football world, it’s hard to be more important than the Heisman. And that’s why it’s hard for me to say this: The Heisman needs a big change to keep it from falling even further off the radar.

Jayden Daniels was the latest winner on Saturday, and he was a deserving winner even with his team's three losses. We can have that debate about whether he should have won, and it’s OK to not agree. That’s what we do in college football: debate things. But he got my vote after what he accomplished with some huge holes on his roster (he doesn’t play defense, after all).

I’ll be interested to see the TV ratings from Saturday because there’s just so much going on right now that it’s hard for the Heisman to be the focus of the sports world.

On Saturday night at the same time as the ceremony, we had the NBA’s inaugural (if you say first annual, we’re going to fight) In-Season Tournament and several top-notch college basketball games. A little later, the FCS playoffs continued with Idaho vs. UAlbany. That’s a lot. It was a busy, glorious day of sports.

And there’s going to be even more next year when the College Football Playoff expands to 12 teams. So think about next December. Just in college football, we’ll have 12 teams getting ready for the Playoff, along with the transfer portal window being open, coaching changes being made and teams preparing for National Signing Day. And yet, we feel the need to jam the Heisman in there too?

There’s an easy fix, and it should have been made years ago: The ceremony should be moved to January after the national championship game.

The Heisman should be a full-season award, and a 12-team Playoff adds even more games that would be left out of Heisman consideration if the ceremony remains in December. What if one of the contenders goes on a historic, memorable run in the Playoff? That certainly would (and should) impact the voting. I know it would for me.

For the past two years, I’ve had a vote for the Heisman for the first time, and I want it to mean a little more and for there to be even more attention on the award and the winner.

That’s hard to accomplish with a jam-packed December schedule in college football and around the whole sports world.

So move the ceremony to January. Have the Heisman Trophy focus on the full season, and let’s get a bigger spotlight on it.

Most of college football’s calendar doesn’t make sense. This would be a small way to help change some of that.

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