No question he is the product of the Wisconsin scheme. He's just one of the very best products of that scheme, including, recently, Ball and Gordon, who each were legitimately among the top handful of CFB running backs. Once upon a time, USC was "tailback U."
Respectfully, if USC RBs could win the Heisman Trophy, why can't Badger RBs?
Part of it is the brand: USC is a bigger brand than Wisconsin. Part of it is the era; it's the QB era. Part of it is luck; only one player per year can win the Heisman. Marcus Mariota was a great college football player (Gordon came in second). So were RGIII and Andrew Luck (Ball was fourth that year). And yeah, there's nothing that says Taylor is better than a couple of the QBs getting the publicity ahead of him now.
And as Badger fans, of course we think our guy--one of the best to play the position in Wisconsin history--deserves a little more attention than he gets. To be fair, not fumbling at a key moment against Illinois would have helped.
For what it's worth, I think Gordon is the most NFL-ready back Wisconsin has produced (he had better ball protection than JT), and I think Dayne is the greatest college back in Wisconsin history, but I put JT at second on the NFL-ready list, and maybe second on the college back list (based on his three years of production for the Badgers), maybe third, again because of the turnovers, behind Gordon.
