Another Legend Named James Brown : The Heisman Hype Could Start if Texas’ Junior Quarterback Leaves Penn State in a Cold Sweat

“This is the West, sir. When the legend becomes fact, print the legend.”

--From ‘The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance’

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It was the first Saturday in December, and two young writers in St. Louis, in a headlong rush to record braggadocio turned into prophecy, sought out someone with a bit of gray hair for historical perspective.

“When Namath guaranteed the Jets would win the Super Bowl, when was it?” one asked.

Super Bowl III, New York 16, Baltimore 7, he was told, and then he and his colleague went off to spin another Texas tale.

Junior quarterback James Brown said three-touchdown underdog Texas would win the Big 12 championship game, then led the Longhorns to a 37-27 victory over Nebraska.

Another addition to Lone Star lore . . . or was it?

“At our press conference . . . everyone kept asking about what it felt like to be a three-touchdown underdog,” says Brown. “I just said, ‘They might lose by 21 points, you never know.’ I didn’t make a prediction.

“It’s just something that came out, and it got all that publicity. I didn’t back down from it, but it’s not good to come out like that with bulletin board material.

“That isn’t smart football.”

It is a good story, and it embellished the reputation of the quarterback.

He is their main man, the one chiefly responsible for their eight victories (against four losses), and they know it.

You doubt?

A week ago, a group of Texas players were taken up into the hills around Tempe, Ariz., for a publicity picture before their Fiesta Bowl game against Penn State.

Brown saw a short rock and sat down. Unbidden, the Longhorns gathered around him and all the photographer had to say was “cheese.”

“James plays with great courage, and he’s been a great leader for us,” Coach John Mackovic said. “This is the big thing for us: James is a real playmaker. Our players know what he can do.”

Brown is as loquacious on the field as he is soft-spoken off it, talking much more easily with teammates and opponents than with reporters.

“James is a competitor,” said guard Dan Neil, who has started 48 games for Texas, including Brown’s first, against Oklahoma in 1994, when he ran for a touchdown and threw for another; and one later that season, in which Brown threw for a school-record five touchdowns against Baylor.

“Hurt, healthy, whatever--he’s going to be out there, and you never doubt him.”

Doubt no, but maybe wonder.

“When James is out there he has that big question mark,” running back Priest Holmes says. “What’s James Brown thinking? You don’t really know.”

He’s thinking about throwing and the running it takes to throw successfully. But mostly, he’s thinking about winning.

“Losing, I can’t stand it,” he says softly.

That’s what has made things so difficult for him at Texas. He’s 40-8-1 as a starting quarterback at Beaumont’s West Brook High and at Texas, but half of those losses have come this season. It’s five if you count last New Year’s Eve in New Orleans, where the Longhorns lost to Virginia Tech, 28-10, in the Sugar Bowl.

“We decided to make him beat us,” said Virginia Tech Coach Frank Beamer. “We were going to rush him, and we didn’t think he could pass well enough to beat us.”

Brown couldn’t, completing only 14 of 37 throws for 148 yards. Worse, he threw three interceptions, was sacked five times and his fumble was returned 20 yards for the final Hokie points.

There had been talk of pushing him into the Heisman Trophy race after a season in which he threw for 2,447 yards and 19 touchdowns, both school records. But as the New Year began, there was silence.

He calls the Heisman his dream and wants his dream to come true.

“It goes to the best player in college football, doesn’t it?” he says. “Who doesn’t want to be the best?”

Where once there was talk of a national campaign, capitalizing on his name identification of the Godfather of Soul and on his right arm, now there were whispers that the arm was no longer a thing of thunder and lightning. That it hurt.

It did. Eschewing surgery for rest, he sat out spring football for the first time in his career, and he spent the first six weeks of this season paying for it. Awkward, if not lacking in confidence, he stood back to throw, for the first time in his life unwilling to take off in a scramble that could make a defense honest.

“The reads, everything, I had to work to get back to where I was,” he says.

Wins over hapless Missouri and worse New Mexico State preceded a loss to Notre Dame in which he threw an interception that set up the tying Irish touchdown in the fourth quarter.

And then came Virginia, in a Saturday night rain in Charlottesville where he completed four of nine passes and threw three first-quarter interceptions, all of which triggered Cavalier touchdown drives.

He watched the rest of the game from the sideline, obediently, if not willingly, while backup Richard Walton finished out a 37-13 defeat.

“I thought I should have gone back in,” Brown says. “I wish I could have played more. I still think I could have done something to help us.”

He had thrown for only 479 yards and four touchdowns in four games. He also had thrown four interceptions.

It seemed the ship was righted in a 71-14 victory over Oklahoma State, but it quickly foundered in an overtime loss to previously winless Oklahoma, always a rival and now one in the Big 12.

To a Texan, losing to the Sooners is worse than $12-a-barrel oil.

The Longhorns gathered for meetings, one called by the coaches, another by the players.

“We said that everyone is going to be held accountable,” Brown says of a group finger-pointing that turned into a group hug. “It was a team unity thing. We talked among ourselves, and said we were playing like we practiced and that wasn’t good.”

It got better, and Brown threw three touchdown passes against Colorado. But still Texas lost, its fourth defeat in five games. After going 10-2-1 last season, the Longhorns were 3-4 and being branded as losers in a state that has no tolerance for football underachievement.

Where was the verve, the spark lit by Brown’s legs, moving around to buy time to throw? He had run for 73 yards in 12 carries, not including sacks, in those first seven games, and James Brown had never been 3-4 in his life.

“He’s a great player,” says wide receiver Mike Adams. “More than that, he is a great physical talent. When he is on a roll, he turns into another running back.”

It took a while, but finally Brown understands.

“I don’t like losing,” he says. “That’s why I started running more, to make things happen. I see that my running helps the offense.”

It helped the Longhorns to victories over Baylor, Texas Tech and Kansas and they went into the Texas A&M; game with a chance to be the Big 12’s South champion and cannon-fodder for North champion Nebraska.

“I think he’s got back playing the way he did last year,” receiver Wane McGarity says. “It seems like he’s a lot more confidence. He can stand in the pocket without panicking, but he also knows that when he scrambles, that throws teams off.”

Brown threw for 336 yards and four touchdowns in a 51-15 victory over the Aggies. In four games, he had passed for 953 yards and eight touchdowns, in part because he had run for 132 yards, excluding sacks, and there weren’t any sacks in the last three games.

Two days later, with Nebraska in waiting, Brown was moved to prophecy.

Or not.

“I know James didn’t mean it the way the press took it,” said tight end Pat Fitzgerald, an All-American from Agoura. “But I thought, ‘So what if he did?’ ”

Brown threw for 353 yards in the victory over the Cornhuskers in his sixth 300-yard game as a Longhorn.

“The difference was James Brown,” said Nebraska defensive end Grant Wistrom, who spent the day in futile chase of the Texas quarterback. “He deserves all the respect he gets.”

That’s a lot of respect. He has passed for 2,468 yards and 17 touchdowns going into a game against Penn State in which nothing would please Brown more than the challenge he faced a year ago: to make him beat the Nittany Lions with his arm.

He has a senior season to play, and the Heisman promotion wheels are churning. All they need is a green flag from a big game in Tempe.

“I want it,” Brown says simply.

But he won’t predict it, or a victory over Penn State.

“I didn’t even know we were favored,” he says.

Besides, he’s been there, done that, and now he’s a Texas legend, whether he wanted to be or not.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

James Brown by the Numbers

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Opponent Com Att Int Yds TD Missouri (W,40-10) 11 20 0 104 2 New Mexico State (W, 41-7) 10 18 0 134 1 Notre Dame (L, 27-24) 14 30 1 178 1 Virginia (L, 37-13) 4 9 3 63 0 Oklahoma State (W, 71-14) 12 16 1 232 0 Oklahoma (L, 30-27) 21 37 0 227 1 Colorado (L, 38-24) 16 35 2 224 3 Baylor (W, 28-23) 11 19 2 178 2 Texas Tech (W, 38-32) 19 32 1 239 1 Kansas (W, 38-17) 15 25 0 200 1 Texas A&M; (W, 51-15) 18 30 0 336 4 Nebraska (W, 37-27) 19 28 2 353 1 Totals 170 299 12 2,468 17 1995 Totals 163 322 12 2,447 19 1994 Totals 80 115 2 1,047 12

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