As far as I am concerned, Christian McCaffrey is not only the best all around player and MVP of college football, but is my pick for the Heisman Trophy...WILDCAFF gets Tailgatin' Teddy's vote hands down. It is uncanny how much he has the same character as his dad did 25 years before: Discipline, poise, toughness, reliability, electric big- play ability and that intangible "IT" factor that brings a winning attitude to his entire team for 4 quarters. Off the field he is humble, polite, intelligent, and has an All-American attitude that is a throwback to when athletes truly were role models both on the field and in the classroom. Most importantly, he plays for his TEAM not his own stats, but if you Google his stats, they are absolutely mind-boggling. He just passed the legendary Barry Sanders single-season all purpose yards of 3,250 yards.
Christian McCaffrey is pure class and is an ambassador to what collegiate athletics are supposed to embody and represent. What is truly amazing is that he is only a sophomore!! Lisa Sime McCaffrey and Eddie McCaffrey were both tremendous athletes at Stanford themselves, so the entire McCaffrey family is that of winners...Thank you and congrats Christian on a stellar season that is a treat for all of us Stanford fans to watch each and every week.
Christian did not win the Heisman and was runner-up to Alabama's Derrick Henry. Let it be said that Derrick Henry seems like an outstanding young man and is one heck of a great running back. But the Heisman ballot voters missed their mark with their pick of the best college football player in the nation and what the award is supposed to represent. Let it be also said, that YES, I am certainly biased: I have a peripheral friendship with the McCaffrey family and am also a huge Stanford football fan. (My brother Touchdown Tommy Vardell was a team mate of both Ed McCaffrey, Christian's dad, and current head coach David Shaw, a great wide receiver himself, while HIS dad was defensive coordinator from 1989-1991.) A little history before I get into why Christian McCaffrey is the best player in college football.
I am what you would call a "stellar spectacular spectator," hence why my nick name my friend Danny Lavis gave me in 1991, is "Tailgatin' Teddy." This was after Dennis Green coined my brother "Touchdown Tommy" for his 4 touchdowns against #1 Notre Dame in 1990, (and where Ed, Tommy, David and the unranked Stanford Cardinal, at 1-3, shocked undefeated Notre Dame, 36-31 in South Bend on 10/6/1990.)
I watched every Stanford game this year, and watching Christian McCaffrey every play has made me feel like kind of a proud surrogate uncle from all my memories of watching Stanford football: I not only got to watch my brother's Stanford and NFL career over the years, but also got to watch Ed McCaffrey and David Shaw grow and excel in their playing and coaching careers over the past 25 years.
I met Coach Shaw with Tommy before the Arizona State game when he was the offensive coordinator at Stanford in 2010. I have never met a more smart, cerebral football thinking coach in all my life. He is a man of humble class and quiet confidence with the "thousand yard stare" of cognitive football intelligence and it was a great experience for me as a fan, to hear him talk about the X's and O's of football. I enjoyed watching David as a great wide receiver player for the Cardinal, who made clutch catches against Colorado in 1990 and Cal in 1991 as #84. I just as much enjoy seeing him today, with that small sly smile and poker face, where he is conjuring up the next play as the Stanford head coach on the sidelines.
I have met Ed several times over the years, and his lovely, fun and friendly wife (and soccer star Stanford grad) Lisa. I recently happened to run into Ed in the elevator before the CU/Stanford game just a few weeks ago. Seeing Ed this time around, it wasn't me remembering and reminiscing all the great plays #40 had at Stanford, or #87 for the NFL and Super Bowl Champion Broncos where he made all those clutch catches he trademarked: All I wanted to talk about this time around, was his son #5 Christian McCaffrey and every electric play he had displayed this season. Ed could not have been more gracious and friendly to me, especially since I haven't seen Lisa or Ed since 1993. Unfortunately in 2015, I have gone from being the brassiere-free semi-handsome, brown-haired older brother of Tommy in 1993, to a much older, semi-handsome, fully receding gray-haired B-cup middle-aged man with my man-boobs that I developed over the past 25 years. Ed looks like he has spent the last 25 years in one of those anti-aging cryonic tanks, as he looks like he could still strap on the pads and helmet like he did for the Super Bowl in 1998.
Ed could have very easily had that vacant stare and said to himself, "TED WHO??" when I approached him: But he was as classy, friendly and nice to me as he was in 1993. He was, and was deservedly so, very proud, that his son Christian was having a stellar 2015 season. (Christian once again, unfortunately, carved up my alma mater Colorado Buffaloes with 220 all purpose yards helping his team on the road to a 42-10 victory in Boulder.)
The entire McCaffrey is pure class and should have a patent on the athlete/football genetic code of academic and athletic excellence. (Under the Webster dictionary when one looks up "ALL AMERICAN FAMILY" there should be a picture of the entire McCaffrey family smiling Olin Mill's style.) If you don't know about the McCaffrey clan, Google it, and you will see about 3,956 pages on their family tree and accomplishments.
I found out to my bafflement this week, that many of the Heisman votes were cast BEFORE Christian had even had a chance to light up the scoreboard with his stellar PAC -12 championship game where he tacked on another 416 all purpose yards, a rushing touchdown, and yes, a touchdown pass. Are you kidding me? How can they cast a ballot before seeing how he plays in the ultimate pressure game of the Pac-12 championship? As a West Coast guy, this makes me more angry than the Tree Ents in the Two Towers. That East Coast/ SEC bias was decided before he even got a chance to showcase the apex of his stellar season in the PAC-12 championship. I felt this way when Andrew Luck got snubbed a few years ago and I feel this way now. "WILDCAFF" is the best college football player in 2015 and I have no doubt people will see this in Pasadena on 1/1/2016.
This outstanding young man not only is a lethal weapon on special teams, but can pass, throw and run like a cheetah. He is truly the definition of an "X-Factor" with his rabbit like speed, toughness, vision, and competitive spirit: (Oh, and by the way, he is also an honors student at Stanford and happens to play the piano and plays it very well, and not just "Chopsticks.")
He is the true ace in the hole for the Cardinal and has demonstrated that all season, being a migraine headache for every defensive coordinator he has gone up against.
Congratulations to the McCaffrey family and especially this outstanding once-in-a-lifetime player, that comes around about MAYBE twice a century. He is a young man that has everything great that makes him an ambassador for the All-American student athlete.
(Oh, one last thing, I saw this morning while having coffee and reading the newspaper that Christian was voted to the All-America Team.)
I am looking forward to see what this young man does on the Farm these next two years, as he still counts his age in the "teens" as a young sophomore. Congratulations Christian: You make Colorado proud. You make the Vardell family proud, and I know you make your family, your mom Lisa and your dad #40 very proud.
Good luck against Iowa in the Rose Bowl Christian and FEAR THE TREE AND #5 MCCAFFREY!!!!!!!!!!!
Needless to say #5 put an exclamation point to this article and to his season in the Rose Bowl blowout.
ReplyDeleteYes he sure did!!!!! He lit up the Rose Bowl for sure!!!
DeleteThat's a love letter if i ever saw one. Nicely shared!
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