You get a watchlist nod! And you get a watchlist nod! He gets a watchlist nod! Everybody gets a watchlist nod!
Still weeks before training camp. Not even any good arrests happening at this point in the college football offseason. So for the myriad of college football individual honors that are quickly forgotten once they are handed out in January (or is it December?), announcing the watchlists for the various awards makes sense.
We are bored/desperate enough. You get attention across all the conferences as long as you include a couple from each conference. Which they do. The watchlist is basically the acknowledgment that, yes this guy might be good and he’s got some hype. We’ll mention him.
So far, Pitt has four players mentioned on the watchlists:
Ray Graham — Maxwell Award (Best college football player)
Aaron Donald — Bednarik Award (Best defensive player)
Hubie Graham — John Mackey Award (Tight End
Ryan Turnley — Rimington Trophy (Center)
The Maxwell and Bednarik watchlists have 65 names each. The Mackey has 33 names and Rimington lists 51 names on their respective watchlists.
Like I said, the awards at least get some attention.