It feels simply like a formality that Joe Burrow will win the Heisman Saturday night, LSU's first since Billy Cannon in 1959.
Still the stage is set and the lights are bright in the Big Apple.
"You grow up watching the Heisman Trophy, and March Madness you hope you can one day be on that stage."
Burrow not only will be on the stage, he'll own it. This season the senior quarterback broke all the import SEC passing records, and his 77.9 completion percentage shatters the NCAA record. It really is only a matter of formality that Joe Burrow is named the Heisman winner.
Still, he will take the stage Saturday night with Ohio State's Justin Fields and Chase Young, and Oklahoma's Jalen Hurts. It's a group that punctuates the transfer culture that has become collegiate athletics. Burrow, Hurts and Fields are all transfers.
"We've all had different experiences, but I think perseverance and pushing through adversity has been a commonality in this," Burrow said Friday.
Burrow will not be the first, nor clearly the last Heisman winner to be a transfer. In fact, he'll be the third-straight winner to transfer. Both Kyler Murray and Baker Mayfield started their careers elsewhere, Kyler at Texas A&M, Baker at Techas Tech. Their transfers and ensuing success paving the way for a change in athletic culture.