More Manti Te'o Heisman thoughts

Here’s a link to my story on Manti Te’o’s slim Heisman Trophy chances. Some other thoughts from the cutting room floor:

Chris Huston, of CBSSports.com’s “Heisman Pundit” and a voter himself, on whether enough things could fall into place for Te’o to have a realistic chance to win, and not just get invited to New York: “You can come up

with scenarios for how that can happen. You can come

up with scenarios for how Mitt Romney could win Illinois, too, but it’s

probably not very likely to happen.”

Huston, on just how amazing a season a defensive player would need to have a chance: “He would have to have the kind of ridiculous season that would be so ridiculous that offenses would never allow it to happen. If you had a defensive end who through the first half of the season had 20 sacks, teams would move away from him. It’s another factor why defensive players are at a disadvantage; they don’t control where the ball’s going, or what the tempo of the game is.”

Notre Dame defensive end Kapron Lewis-Moore: “I just hope Manti wins it at the end of the day. He’s very well deserving. I’m gonna be biased. He’s my teammate and I hope he wins it, and I’m gonna do everything in my power to help him win it.”

Lewis-Moore, on whether that’s realistic: “Yeah, it’s realistic. It goes out to the best player in college football, and I think he’s the best player in college football.”

Notre Dame linebacker Carlo Calabrese, one of Te’o’s closest friends: “We have a great defensive player in Manti. He’s doing a great job each week with all the tackles he’s getting, the interceptions, and he’s a great leader on and off the field. If he keeps doing what he’s doing, I think he has a great chance of getting it.”

Calabrese, on whether that’s realistic: “Definitely. Definitely him.”