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O’Gara: Yes, it’s early, but here’s why Tre Harris should be on the Heisman Trophy radar
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The more I scrolled, the angrier I got.
As I searched for Tre Harris’ name in the latest Heisman Trophy odds on DraftKings, I tried to keep things in perspective. I knew I wouldn’t see him in the top 10 because those spots are reserved for the top quarterbacks and perhaps the top running back through 4 weeks. No big deal.
Then I kept scrolling and saw someone like Arch Manning, who is tied for No. 14 at +4,000 even though he only has 1 start and the only Heisman Trophy winner in the past 40 years who missed a Power 5 start was Charlie Ward. Still, though. That’s no big deal. He’s a headliner name.
But then it got weird. Or rather, infuriating.
There were +12,000 odds for Texas A&M’s Conner Weigman, who missed his past 2 starts with injury and is uncertain to be the starter moving forward after he was dreadful in the opener against Notre Dame. Then there were +13,000 odds for former Aggie and current Oregon receiver Evan Stewart, who hit 30 yards in 1 of 3 games he played this season.
But wait! It gets worse!
At +25,000, that’s Jackson Arnold, AKA the Oklahoma quarterback who got benched in the first half of his first SEC game, and will now be second string behind Michael Hawkins Jr. Speaking of benched quarterbacks who’ll be at Jordan-Hare Stadium on Saturday, is that … Payton Thorne at +25,000?!?!?!?! I want to meet the individual who places that bet. I’d like to study their brain and find out why, in the words of Michael Scott, “they are the way they are.”
The way it is currently, Harris is at +30,000 to win the Heisman. That’s 300-to-1 odds. There are 72 players in college football with better odds to win the award. There are 18 FBS teams with multiple players who have better odds than Harris.
Oh, by the way. I buried the lead. I asked this question because Harris is currently No. 2 in FBS with 628 receiving yards having averaged 157 yards per game. He has 280 more receiving yards than the next-closest SEC receiver (Andrew Armstrong has 348 yards). If Harris racks up 79 receiving yards on Saturday against Kentucky — he has his toughest matchup of the year against ball-hawking pick-6 machine Maxwell Hairston — he’ll have more pre-October receiving yards of any Power 5 receiver in the Playoff era. That would be the best number by a Power 5 receiver since Brandin Cooks had 807 pre-October receiving yards for Oregon State in 2013.
Now do I have your attention?
I know, I know. Now is the part where you tell me that his odds are so low because Ole Miss hasn’t played anyone yet and that’s why Harris isn’t in the neighborhood of even sniffing Heisman talk. You’re gonna tell me that putting up an 11-catch, 225-yard performance against Georgia Southern was basically balling out against air.
Fine. Tell me if this is impressive against air:
225 yard night for @_treharris13 pic.twitter.com/qtDYHYH7M6
— Ole Miss Football (@OleMissFB) September 22, 2024
Spend time watching Harris. You’ll see while the quarterback and scheme are certainly working in his favor, so are his body control and catch radius. As long as he’s been on the field for Ole Miss, the former Louisiana Tech transfer has been making plays.
Last year, Harris’ Ole Miss debut consisted of him hauling in 3 touchdowns in the first 3 minutes and 15 seconds. That’s not a typo. He suffered a leg injury on the second drive of last year’s Week 2 game at Tulane. By that point, he’d already racked up 5 touchdowns. Harris only started and finished 10 games last year, yet he still racked up 985 receiving yards.
Maybe part of the reason that Harris isn’t getting national attention is because last year against Georgia, he was held to 2 catches for 12 yards. There’s a possibility that can turn around in this year’s matchup. Top UGA corner Daylen Everette is allowing the most yards/target among SEC corners (via @SEC_StatCat).
When DeVonta Smith became the first receiver to win the Heisman in 29 years, it helped that he torched the Dawgs for 167 yards and 2 touchdowns. It also helped that the following game, Jaylen Waddle suffered an injury that knocked him out of the regular season, which made Smith’s 1,511 pre-Heisman ceremony receiving yards all the more impressive against an SEC-only schedule.
Nobody is saying that Harris is a lock to even flirt with that type of a season. If Harris were to match Smith’s 137.4 pre-Heisman receiving yards/game mark, that would mean 1,786 yards with him playing in all 13 games. Yeah, I said 13 games. Harris won’t become the second receiver to win the Heisman in the 21st century without leading Ole Miss to Atlanta for the first time. That total, which would mean averaging 128.6 receiving yards/game the rest of the season, would also give him the most pre-Heisman receiving yards of any player in SEC history.
As wild as that number is, former Ole Miss receiver Elijah Moore averaged 149 receiving yards/game against an all-SEC schedule in 2020. We just watched Malik Nabers average 141 receiving yards in conference play, as did 2019 Ja’Marr Chase, though neither had the nonconference yards boost that Harris will have.
As much as his success is dependent on having elite quarterback play from Jaxson Dart, let’s be honest. Harris will likely be blocked from even getting to New York, much less winning the award, if Dart stays healthy. If we saw Dart miss a start and Harris still went off with Austin Simmons getting his first career start, that would change. Nobody is rooting for the ever-durable Dart to miss any time, but if we’re discussing an actual Heisman path for Harris, that’s it.
It’s a long shot. Once upon a time, the same was true for Smith. He started the year with +5,000 odds and even with 2 regular season games to play, he was only at +2,500. It’s fair to assume that even if Harris continues to put up video game numbers, you’ll still likely have to scroll a ways down to find him on the latest odds.
Sooner or later, though, we better not have to read the name “Payton Thorne” to get there.
Connor O'Gara is the senior national columnist for Saturday Down South. He's a member of the Football Writers Association of America. After spending his entire life living in B1G country, he moved to the South in 2015.
