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Caleb Williams makes college football top-10 supervillain list
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- Caleb Williams makes college football top-10 supervillain list
Caleb Williams certainly was a polarizing figure in college football. He obviously made Oklahoma fans very mad when he left for USC to join Lincoln Riley . Yet, college football has existed for more than 155 years. Is Caleb Williams really one of the top 10 supervillains in college football history? ESPN's Ryan McGee says yes:
"There is no shortage of recent Heisman winners and contenders who could have taken this spot (see the Dishonorable Mentions list below and Misters Mayfield and Pavia ). But Williams' story was a perfect storm of what everyone loves to hate about modern college football. He hit the transfer portal to move from Oklahoma to USC to follow head coach Lincoln Riley. He made what was then a record stack of NIL cash and starred in national TV ads during his own games when that was still something we'd never seen before. He won the Heisman Trophy in 2022, and when USC was eliminated from title contention in '23, he cried in his mother's arms ... and people loathed him so much they made fun of him over it. But he also didn't -- and still doesn't -- shy away from leaning into the mean side of social media, nor has he ever apologized for relishing his bad guy role."
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When you consider the other supervillain-worthy figures in college football history (most of which are on the list), putting Caleb there seems overdone and an example of recency bias. There were supreme villains in the sport in the 1910s and 1930s, but none of the selections go back farther than the 1980s with Oklahoma's Brian Bosworth. It's an obvious limitation on the list. Caleb Williams, in our view, doesn't make this particular top 10.
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This article originally appeared on Trojans Wire: Caleb Williams makes college football top-10 supervillain list
