TrojanNYC.com

Matt Leinart Named Sporting News' College Football Athlete of the Decade

From SportingNews.com:

He was never a living legend like Tebow—never quite had the same visceral presence—but Leinart had a 37-2 record as a starter, won or shared two national titles and owns a Heisman Trophy. Moreover, he was Pete Carroll's point man as the Trojans went from rising power to the kings of college football. If not for a historic Vince Young-led drive in one of sports' greatest championship games ever, the case for Leinart would be crystal clear.

Even as a SC/Leinart fan, I have to admit this pick is premature considering Tim Tebow hasn't even finished his college career yet.  If Florida wins the NC this year, there is no Tebow vs. Leinart debate.  Even if Tebow just gets Florida to the NC game and loses, it's still tough.  You can say Leinart won 2 NCs as a starter (Tebow was a "back-up" for his 1st NC), but Tebow got the job done against tougher competition.  Hard to say at this point.

Major Edit: Putting Matt Barkley's Interceptions Into Perspective

From the Official blog:

When looking back at previous seasons, Barkley's stat line from training camp puts him on pace -- if not at an even better rate -- than USC's quarterbacks in the past seven years. Take a look:

Matt Barkley ('09 Fall Camp):    301-for-486 • 61.9% • 8 interceptions

Mark Sanchez (2008 season):   241-for-366 • 65.8% • 10 interceptions

John David Booty ('07 season):  215-for-340 • 63.2% • 10 interceptions

John David Booty ('06 season):  269-for-436 • 61.7% • 9 interceptions

Matt Leinart (2005 season):       283-for-431 • 65.7% • 8 interceptions

Matt Leinart (2004 season):       269-for-412 • 65.3% • 6 interceptions   *Heisman Trophy winner

Matt Leinart (2003 season):       255-for-402 • 63.4% • 9 interceptions

Carson Palmer (2002 season):   309-for-489 • 63.2% • 10 interceptions  *Heisman Trophy winner

EDIT:  This is what I get for not reading Ben Malcolmson's posts all the way through.  I completely missed this part of his post while writing my previous entry:

Barkley's 486 throws -- he completed 301 of them for a 61.9% rate --  is a little bit more than a typical season's worth of attempts, so eight interceptions would be a phenomenally low number in the grand scheme of things. And to make it even more calming is the fact that Barkley won't be facing one of the nation's top defensive backfields week-in and week-out, like he does in practice each day.

It didn't even cross my mind that the stats of the previous QBs above could come from the regular season - it was such a ridiculous idea that I didn't even bother to check up on it.  Well of course it turns out Ben actually used REGULAR SEASON stats to compare with Barkley's CAMP stats, which is as apple-to-oranges as you can possibly get and completely meaningless.  So scratch my previous post, I'll leave it up as a major FAIL for TNYC.

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Previous Post: Very interesting stats.  Matt has the second lowest INT/Passes ratio (1.65%), second only to Leinart in 2004 (1.46%).  You can even argue that Barkley's stat is more impressive considering the secondary he faced - likely the best of the Pete Carroll era.  If memory serves me correct, in 2004 we had guys like Jason Leach, Darnell Bing, Eric Wright, Ronald Nunn, and Justin Wyatt; a good group but not on the same level as Mays, Pink, KeTo, and Shareece.

Although the stats above do help put things into perspective, it also can be a bit misleading.  More so than the actual number of interceptions, it's obviously more important to look at how/when those interceptions happened.  Barkley has shown a higher propensity to force throws than say Leinart in '04 and '05 so you would almost have to assign a weight to those INTs.  

Moreover, looking back to 2005, Leinart had the same number of INTs and a slightly worse INT/Passes ratio (1.86%), but if anyone remembers the '05 Fall camp/scrimmages, he controlled the offense in his sleep and walked the 1st team up-and-down the field with ease.  That's no knock on Barkley; obviously Leinart had the greater advantage of being in the system for years and playing with guys like Reggie Bush, Dwayne Jarrett, and LenDale White, but it does serve as another check on making conclusions based off of INT numbers.

The stats above should rightfully quell those that are making extreme statements of Barkley being a loose cannon and put things into perspective, but at the same time, it's also silly to use it as justification in saying that Matt is in a equal position to lead the offense as the other QBs on the list in their respective years.

Video: Matt Leinart on Tradition of USC Football

Matt talking about his experiences and the tradition at USC.