The Little Trophy Comes to Life

By Tom Callahan

A passing delight, Doug Flutie winds down a career too short

Because the biggest, greatest and best are tossed about so easily in sports, like footballs in the Miami rain, the most articulate superlative left may be just a gasp changing to a sigh, such as Doug Flutie brought to college football last week. The most cuddly player in history, or at least since Eddie LeBaron, appears about to run away with the Heisman trophy. Mindful that there have been stirring football finishes for 100 years, and rip-roaring games the equal of Boston College's 47-45 victory over Miami, it can be fairly stated that never have a forward pass and a statue's unveiling been more favorably timed.

As devoted as sportsmen are to collecting shiny gewgaws, this is the only athletic mantel piece that would be noticed at Westminster Abbey, and the thought of it cradled under the arm of Flutie, or vice versa, brings a smile. Exactly 25 Ibs. of bronze immortality, the Heisman figurine depicts a stiff-arming ballcarrier, a suggestive pose these past 49 years to a literal-minded electorate that now numbers 1,050 experts, some of whom have seen a college football game this season. Although emblematic of the best player, whatever his position, the Heisman never has exalted an interior lineman, and runners have been preferred to quarterbacks. Flutie has the instincts of a runner ("I just love tucking the ball and taking off"), but he is a quarterback from head to toe, a distance of 5 ft. 9 3/4 in. "I don't know how I could play," he says, "if the ball wasn't in my hands and the game wasn't in my control."

Still, some four seasons and 11,000 yds. ago, he was willing to find out. Initially refused a scholarship at Boston College, then tendered the last one available after a coaching change, Flutie arrived from nearby Natick High as a fourth-stringer. By the final quarter of his fourth idle Saturday, glumly watching B.C. in its usual throes--this time trailing Penn State 31-0--he had about resolved to ask Jack Bicknell for a trial at wide receiver, when the coach turned and scanned the bench. In the best tradition of the worst movies, Flutie went in and passed for 135 yds.

While Penn State won that game, the Nittany Lions make a good touchstone for the spectacular Flutie years. He threw on them for 520 yds. the next season, 380 the year after that and 447 a few weeks ago, getting on to a mile against one team alone. He has passed for 10,303 yds. in all and has run that up to 11,054, both major-college records. But the cold figures are not what has warmed New Englanders, who as a rule show no more passion than penchant for this primal sport of Texas and Ohio. Boston College was 0-11 as recently as 1978, and while the Eagles are currently 8-2 and bound for the Cotton Bowl, no one expects that to be their standard fare from now on. Locally, the Flutie phenomenon has been regarded as an age of delight that will never be repeated, and maybe the country should share the lament.

For, as college football becomes more of a job and less of a joy, and as the athletes grow greater and larger and too much alike, when will there be another player so natural and resourceful and so much fun? Will a 5-ft. 9 3/4-in., 174-lb. man ever again win the Heisman? Only Flutie seems unsure whether he has won it yet. "I can't help dreaming of the Heisman," he says, "but it scares me more than any thing." Immediately following the Holy Cross game in Worcester this week, he will be airlifted to New York City's Downtown Athletic Club for the announcement. Last year he was on the program as the underclassman in waiting. Keith Byars, a junior tailback from Ohio State, and Bernie Kosar, the sophomore quarterback from Miami, appear best suited for that part now. Against Flutie's 472 yds. passing last week, Kosar had 447. He left Boston College only 28 seconds to travel the last 80 yds. With two seconds left, Flutie was reeling backward from his own 48-yd. line to the 36, but then spun the last pass 65 yds. in the air to Roommate Gerard Phelan. Kosar walked away.

The Heisman was always Flutie's to lose, and he did not, so early-season injuries to Auburn Junior Bo Jackson and Navy Senior Napoleon McCallum seem less significant than just sad, McCallum's fractured ankle especially. He went to the Naval Academy to become an astronaut and became the nation's top all-purpose runner instead. Forty carries and 191 yds. into this season, only 83 yds. from the Navy rushing record, McCallum broke down in the process of struggling to get out of bounds to stop the clock. Still fighting time, he has not despaired of making it back for Army this week or of preserving his pro skills through a five-year military hitch.

Flutie's professional future looks as wide open at 22 as his offense. He might be Roger Staubach, the best, and he could be Gary Beban, the bust. He even has the potential to join Pete Dawkins of Army and Princeton's Dick Kazmaier as the only Heisman winners since 1951 to eschew the business. Already in possession of a National Football Foundation scholarship, Flutie has been nominated for a Rhodes. (He doesn't drink or smoke either.) A few National Football League scouts have been commending him to the U.S.F.L. or Canada. "Maybe somebody will roll the dice and give him a chance," the New York Giants' Tom Boisture has said, "but not us." Dick Steinberg of the New England Patriots agreed: "What can you say? He's short."

The Washington Redskins' Bobby Beathard is of a different mind: "Certainly Flutie can play in the N.F.L. We have a lot of so-called misfits that weren't the right this or that. I think he's a terrific football player, and he has the things that you can't coach. Given his ability to move around, and the adaptability of coaches today, I don't believe his size will stop him." Beathard tried out at quarterback for the Redskins in 1959, when Eddie Le Baron was a drop-back passer of 5 ft. 7 in. All quarterbacks are screened by their blockers, but LeBaron showed him that vision can be more profound than sight lines. "Flutie's got the most important thing, I think -- inside."

In Flutie's own view, "everything points to the U.S.F.L., if you know what I mean." Riches are already whispered. "But for some reason, deep down inside, I just have a feeling I'll wind up in the N.F.L. I'm not the greatest athlete in the world, as far as height, speed, strength or anything else. But I'm a good blend ol a number of things," not the least of them fun.

-- By Tom Callahan