Reggie Bush was stripped of his Heisman Trophy, a fact everyone knows, but the whole notion of a stripped or vacated award is the dumbest punishment in sports. Imagine stripping the Houston Astros of their World Series title for cheating. That wouldn’t change the fact that the Astros celebrated in 2017 and the Los Angeles Dodgers walked off the field in Game 7 sad and heartbroken that they didn’t win.
A real punishment for the Astros would have been to suspend Jose Altuve a full season without pay. That would have actually affected (hurt) the Astros’ ability to win a championship.
That point aside, what happened to Reggie Bush and his Heisman would not be an NCAA violation today, in the world of NIL. Bush would have been able to cash in on the opportunity to play college sports. As with the other things USC was punished for at the end of the Pete Carroll era, those violations look like such small potatoes today, in a larger context. It’s just one reason why Bush deserves his 2005 Heisman Trophy back.
Saturday, Caleb Williams should become USC’s first Heisman winner since Bush. The official record books say that USC has only six Heisman winners, but we know Bush celebrated winning the award 17 years ago. If you want to be technical and precise about it, fine: USC doesn’t have seven Heisman winners according to the official record book, but it does have seven men who have heard their name called as Heisman winners on Heisman Night. It has seven men who have posed with the Heisman Trophy after being declared the winner.
Saturday, Caleb Williams will make it eight, more than any other school.
Let’s look back at Reggie Bush’s 2005 season and his football playing career: