According to On3’s Andy Staples, when thinking about potential Heisman Trophy winners, you shouldn’t be thinking only of the likes of Arch Manning and Garrett Nussmeier. For the college football analyst, there’s a player who could be a dark horse for the 2025 Heisman Trophy race: Clemson’s T.J. Parker.
Parker has been a starter for Dabo Swinney’s team for the last two seasons, and in 2024, he was named a Second Team All-ACC selection for his efforts. Here’s what Staples said about the defensive lineman this week and about his possibilities of winning the Heisman:
“I still think at some point we’ll see a dominant defensive lineman win the Heisman. My first-place vote in my first season as a voter (2009) went to Nebraska defensive tackle Ndamukong Suh, and I still believe he was the best player in the country that season.”
“This season, Parker returns after racking up 19.5 tackles for loss in 2024. He’ll be playing in a better scheme orchestrated by new defensive coordinator Tom Allen, who called plays for Abdul Carter at Penn State last season,” he added.
Last season, T.J. Parker recorded 34 solo tackles, 23 assisted tackles, 11 sacks, and six forced fumbles. All of those numbers were career highs for the Clemson man. When he joined the Tigers in 2023, he was considered a four-star recruit and the sixth-best defensive lineman nationwide in his class. He was considered the 43rd-best overall prospect in his class by 247Sports.
Parker has also been garnering some attention in the NIL game, being the Clemson player with the third-best valuation at $1.1 million.
Arch Manning Opens Up on Being Considered Favorite To Win Heisman Trophy in 2025
One of the weirdest preseason facts for 2025 is that the favorite to win the most coveted award in college football is a player who has only started in two games in his entire collegiate career.
The weirdness of it all doesn’t escape Texas’ Arch Manning, who spoke about it during the SEC media days last week in Atlanta:
“I’m not really sure how they get these opinions. Cuz I’ve only played, what? Two games? But I guess it’s nice of them to say, but it doesn’t mean anything. Talk is cheap, I gotta go prove it,” Manning told the members of the press during the SEC media days
Arch Manning on the Heisman hype and championship talk around him:
“It’s nice of them to say, but it doesn’t mean anything. Talk is cheap, I gotta go prove it”
(via @TreyWallace_) pic.twitter.com/V2ALtIj1zt
— Arch Manning Highlights (@ArchHighlights) July 15, 2025
At the moment, Manning is the clear favorite to win the Heisman Trophy. According to BetMGM, he had odds of +600 to win the award, and his closest competitor, LSU’s Garrett Nussmeier, has odds of +850.
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