Tennessee football: ESPN gives Hendon Hooker egregiously low tier

Quarterbacks not getting respect by ESPN is nothing new to Tennessee football. Vol fans still blame the network over 20 years later for Peyton Manning not winning the Heisman. However, its recent treatment of Hendon Hooker is downright egregious.

David Hale of ESPN listed Hooker a Tier 3 quarterback in his ranking of all 131 college football quarterback situation by tiers. This tier is described as “pretty…pretty good” and includes eight players. However, there are two tiers above it for Heisman candidates.

One tier is the Heisman waiting room, which involves four quarterbacks, and the other is the Heisman or Bust camp, which involves three quarterbacks. Tennessee football’s quarterback at least belonged in the Heisman or Bust camp.

Quarterbacks in tiers above Hooker included Stetson Bennett of the Georgia Bulldogs, Devin Leary of the N.C. State Wolfpack, Cameron Rising of the Utah Utes and Tyler Van Dyke of the Miami Hurricanes. None of those players belong over Hooker.

Last year, despite taking second-team reps all preseason and being inserted as the starter against the Pittsburgh Panthers, Hooker had more total yards, passing and rushing, than all four of those quarterbacks. He also had a better completion percentage and a better touchdown to interception ratio than all of them.

Bennett was the only quarterback to have more yards per passing attempt, and Leary was the only one to have more total touchdowns. He beat Hooker by one. How could anybody look at Hooker’s production with Tennessee football last year and say these guys are over him?

There may be a tendency to credit Josh Heupel and his system more than Hooker, but nobody does that when Alabama Crimson Tide players win award after award under Nick Saban’s elite systems on both sides of the ball. Urban Meyer was a spread offense genius. That didn’t stop Tim Tebow from winning the Heisman.

Also, if you want to throw in Heupel, Vol fans can throw in everything Hooker had to deal with last year. UT was undergoing a massive transition phase given the amount of attrition due to Jeremy Pruitt’s firing, they were coming off a 3-7 year, and they were under NCAA investigation.

Even if you want to bring up Hooker having help in guys like Cedric Tillman as his go-to wideout, does anybody believe that Bennett isn’t surrounded by help? Tillman was once a two-star and didn’t emerge until last year, so Hooker has to have some credit.

There are players you can put above Hooker given what they have done last year and their upside. However, not considering Hooker among the Heisman candidates is outrageous given what he has already shown on the field. There’s no reason for that type of disrespect.

Still, as mentioned earlier, maybe Hale is just onto the fact that Tennessee football isn’t allowed to win Heisman Trophies. They’ve had three runner-ups, and two of them lost for the exact opposite reasons, Manning and Johnny Majors.