Put up the billboards. Pass out the T-shirts. Get the campaign rolling.
Wayne Knight for Heisman!
Why should UCLA tout its tiniest running back for college football’s biggest award only four games into the season?
Why the heck not?
Have you seen the guy? He’s the most electric player in the nation, bursting through holes, spinning around defenders, a highlight on seemingly every play.
Helping his resurgent team stand improbably tall under a first-year coach, the 5-foot-7 ball of energy has catapulted the unbeaten Bruins back into the national rankings while placing them on the brink of becoming a national story.
Here’s giving you first dibs on what everyone else will be saying a month from now.
The guy is a winner, with a combination of speed, patience and power unlike anything Bruins fans have seen.
Knight has already generated early buzz with his nine rushing touchdowns – tied for second in the nation – while ranking third nationally with 164.75 all-purpose yards per game. Those stats helped him win the weekly Paul Hornung Award – given to the most versatile college player in college football – in two of the season’s first three weeks.
He’ll need UCLA (4-0) to keep winning while maintaining his production against better teams, starting with the No. 23 Bruins’ showdown against No. 15 Oregon on Oct. 10 at Autzen Stadium.
“If the Bruins are going to beat the Ducks in Eugene,” Gary Beban, UCLA’s only Heisman Trophy winner, wrote in an email to the California Post, “Wayne has to have a big game!!”
Fortunately, the stage shouldn’t be too big for the little guy considering what he’s already done there. Those who watched Knight in his final game at James Madison saw him trample the Ducks defense on the way to 110 rushing yards in December during the College Football Playoff.
But there’s more work to be done than offensive coordinator Dean Kennedy cooking up another masterful game plan in what amounts to a rematch for most of the coaching staff and 11 transfers from James Madison.
Before facing Oregon, the Bruins must take a page from the Ducks’ PR playbook.
Remember those “Joey Heisman” billboards in Times Square in 2001? They were a revolutionary way to promote Oregon quarterback Joey Harrington to millions of pedestrians.
A quarter of a century later, the Ducks remain the publicity standard that should make every other college football team one of their many uniform shades of green with envy.
While Oregon coach Dan Lanning and several of his players conducted youth camps in Japan this summer, the school touted quarterback Dante Moore on massive digital billboards in Tokyo’s Shinjuku and Shibuya districts.
One of the taglines on the ads: “Yes, there’s Moore!”
It’s time for UCLA to do more when it comes to marketing its top player.
Having already endorsed his “Dark Knight” nickname, much to the delight of “Batman” fans everywhere, Knight has provided his school with one possible campaign slogan.
There’s endless ways to promote him, including billboards, T-shirts, digital ads, airplane banners, email blasts and social media blitzes.
Here’s suggesting the Bruins strike in Ducks territory, springing for a strategically placed billboard in downtown Portland. Or maybe those who spent all that money on airplane banners to fly over the Rose Bowl pull out their checkbooks for a banner to circle Autzen Stadium.
One-upping Oregon in Niketown would be one of the most badass moves ever.
UCLA hasn’t come close to producing a Heisman winner since quarterback Cade McNown finished third in the voting in 1998. Others firmly in the running included quarterback Troy Aikman (1988) and halfback Paul Cameron (1953), who both also finished third.
UCLA’s replica of the trophy that Beban won in 1967 was recently spotted in the lobby of the Wasserman Center. Like its humble owner, Beban’s trophy has been put to some inconspicuous uses, including a doorstop, clothes hanger and anchor for a leaning Christmas tree. It now resides with his son in New York’s Hudson Valley.
Beban, who turned 80 in August, suggested that his alma mater should start beating the drum for Knight if he stars in a win over the Ducks.
Why wait?
Chancellor Julio Frenk, athletic director Tim Harris and coach Bob Chesney have already signaled that this isn’t the same old stodgy UCLA.
The moment to start a Heisman movement is here.
“About time for another Bruin,” Beban wrote, “after 59 years.”
