COMMENTARY : For Ward, Winning the Heisman a Moving Tribute

It was Charlie Ward’s first snowstorm and first Heisman Trophy. Predictably, neither threw him for a loss.

“I am relieved,” he said. “Ten or 15 years later, it’ll probably mean more. You’re out of it, you don’t have as much to worry about.”

He was talking about the Heisman, not the snowstorm. He’d flown up from sunny Florida Saturday morning, and now the snow and winds of the Northeast’s first winter storm were swirling outside, while media and young autograph seekers swirled around him inside.

His proud parents, dressed in purple, stood at the back of the drafty eighth-floor gym that was serving as the interview room at the Downtown Athletic Club. The only thing that didn’t look out of place was the baskets. Ward, who may become the first Heisman Trophy winner to play in the NBA, would have been a lot happier shooting a few than answering a few. But it wasn’t that kind of day.

“I always watched (the Heisman presentation) on TV because it’s a special ceremony,” the Florida State quarterback said. “But I never thought about winning the Heisman Trophy or getting this kind of attention. I’m still not used to it. I guess you have to accept it, and keep moving.”

Ward, like the Sundance Kid, is better when he moves. He holds or is tied for 17 Florida State total offense and passing records. Saturday, he set another record. He received 91 percent of the first-place votes in the balloting, the highest percentage in the Heisman’s 59-year history. He beat runner-up Heath Shuler by 1,622 votes, a margin surpassed only by O.J. Simpson’s 1,750 over Leroy Keyes in 1968. Shuler, Tennessee’s junior quarterback, and Alabama senior flanker David Palmer were also invited to the festivities, but if Ward had lost, it would have been as big an upset as the sun rising in the west.

“The pressure of being the front-runner all year was tough,” Ward said, “but I endured it.”

The Heisman Trophy is supposed to go to the outstanding player in college football, but if you want your kid to win it, don’t let him play defense. In almost all cases, the voters -- media and past winners -- vote for the best offensive back. Charlie is the 20th quarterback to win the a-Ward. Thirty-five running backs have won. The last defensive player to win was Notre Dame end Leon Hart in 1949, and he played both ways.

Not that anyone quibbled with Ward’s credentials. Besides being the best college football/basketball player in America, with a victory over undefeated Nebraska in the Orange Bowl, Ward could give Florida State and Coach Bobby Bowden its first national championship. He’s already given the Seminoles their first Heisman. Having Ward, Bowden says, “is like having the answers to the test before you take the test.”

Ward had all the answers Saturday, and they were all pleasant and earnestly dull. Ward, 23, a throwback to simpler days, only makes headlines on the field.

Willard and Charlie Ward Sr. reared him that way. Ward, a fifth-year senior from Thomasville, Ga., dedicated his Heisman to his deceased grandfathers, because, he said, they reared his parents right, and they, in turn, reared him right. Even as the children of some of the club members were touching and circling his trophy, his mother said her son’s Heisman didn’t mean as much to her as the FSU degree he will receive this month in leisure studies (recreation).

“That Heisman is going to help him make a lot of contacts, meet a lot of nice people, and he can come up and use this club, which is all nice,” she said. “But I’ve watched that pro league, and you’re here today, gone tomorrow. If he has an injury or people don’t feel that he’s good, he’s got his degree and he can go and get him a job.”

There are, of course, hundreds of agents and attorneys who would love to help her son get his first job, as long as it’s of the athletic variety. Ward says he hasn’t yet decided whether he’ll opt for the NBA or NFL. After the Orange Bowl, his thoughts won’t be on that, but on putting on his basketball togs and trying to lead the Seminoles to an ACC and NCAA championship.

“We’ve been bombarded with agents and attorneys,” Willard Ward said. “Over Thanksgiving, I organized the mail in alphabetical order. I meet them because I want to be nice and cordial, but the decision will be Charlie’s. He’s well capable of deciding what he wants.”

You must be proud, we told her husband.

“It’s not proud,” he said. “I’m thankful and grateful. I’m a Sunday school teacher and a deacon, and words like that can turn on you.”

Which is probably part of the reason his son is a man of few words. There was one radio interviewer who kept sticking a microphone in young Charlie’s face, rhapsodizing on and on about all the awards Charlie had won. He seemed to be seeking some sort of “I’m the Greatest” quote. Not in a million years.

“I’m a team guy, and it’s tough because people pick you out of the group,” Ward said. “I accept it, and my teammates accept it.”

More than accept it, they love it. They look at their leader with near reverence, this man who can easily keep his head when all about him are losing theirs at his endless a-Wards. Including this, the big one.

“I’ll talk to the guys (past Heisman winners),” Ward said. “Find out the wisdom they can pass on to me.”

Doesn’t sound as if they can pass on much that Charlie Ward doesn’t already know: Play big, talk small, and keep movin’.