Cam's Second Consecutive Once In A Lifetime Season

[AUChizad]

http://www.al.com/sports/index.ssf/2011/12/cam_newton_constructs_second_s.html

Cam Newton constructs his second consecutive once-in-a-lifetime season
Published: Tuesday, December 27, 2011, 5:00 AM
Kevin Scarbinsky, Birmingham News

BIRMINGHAM, Alabama - It is entirely possible, when his career is done, that Cam Newton won't go down in history as the best college and professional football player to apprentice in this state.

He could be abducted by aliens. Or he could decide that it's easier to be an icon and an entertainer in Hollywood, perhaps as a next-generation Terminator.

Hey, if anyone around here has demonstrated that anything's possible, at least since Bo Jackson's hip betrayed him, it's Newton.

One year after putting together the single best season by any player in college football history in leading Auburn to a BCS title, Newton is one game away from completing the best season by a rookie quarterback in NFL history. If he doesn't win rookie of the year, there should be an investigation, but this time, it should be a probe designed to help him with facts, not hurt him with speculation.

Fact: Newton has thrown for 3,893 yards, more than any NFL rookie ever, breaking a record set in 1998 by future Hall of Famer Peyton Manning. Manning set the record by throwing 575 times. Newton has 492 attempts.

Fact: Newton has run for 14 touchdowns, more than any quarterback in league history in one season, rookie or otherwise. The NFL career record for rushing touchdowns by a quarterback is 43 by Hall of Famer Steve Young. Newton is almost a third of the way there after one year.

Fact: Newton also has thrown 20 TD passes. The only other player in NFL history with at least 20 passing touchdowns and 10 rushing touchdowns in the same season is Kordell Stewart, who had 20 and 10 for the Steelers in 1997.
Kevin Scarbinsky is a columnist for The Birmingham News. His column is published on Sunday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday.

Fact: Newton played the first 884 snaps of the season for the Carolina Panthers and didn't take a seat all year until the fourth quarter of Saturday's 48-16 win over Tampa Bay. With the rookie at quarterback, the Panthers have improved from last in the league in total offense and scoring to fourth in yards and fifth in points.

Fact: The 48 points Carolina scored Saturday was the second-highest single-game total in team history.

Fact: Carolina finished 2-14 last season, which earned the Panthers the No. 1 overall draft pick they brilliantly used to select Newton. With their season finale left at New Orleans, the Panthers are 6-9 after winning four of their last five.

Fact: Newton turned the Tampa Bay Bucs into the Ole Miss Rebels on Christmas Eve. Granted, the Bucs are bad, but he made them look worse. Among his four touchdowns, he ran one in from 49 yards, and he completed one for 91 yards.

Fact: The 91-yarder was the longest passing TD in Carolina history.

Fact: If Newton throws for 107 yards and runs for 26 against the Saints, he'll be the first quarterback in NFL history to throw for 4,000 yards and run for 700 in the same season. No NFL quarterback has thrown for 4,000 yards and run for even 500 in the same season.

Fact: Newton averages 260 passing yards and 45 rushing yards a game. He can put up below-average numbers for him in the final regular-season game and still complete the kind of season the NFL has never seen before.

Why so many facts and figures? Because so many of Newton's misguided and short-sighted critics couldn't see the production for the personality after his Heisman season at Auburn. They were blinded by things they could see but didn't believe, like his smile and his exuberance, or things they couldn't see but still believed, like the blatantly false ideas that he wasn't a leader in the locker room or a student in the film room.

That's funny. He must've been doing something during the NFL lockout besides filming Under Armour TV spots.

There are no exact numbers for these questions, but they're fun to consider just the same. Has any professional athlete proven more people wrong in a shorter period of time? Has any football player accomplished more in his final college season and his first NFL season combined?

Short answers: No and no. For the second consecutive year, while stepping up from the highest level of college football to the highest level of football - period - Newton has put together a once-in-a-lifetime season.

Of course, you're free to continue doubting him. All real and actual evidence to the contrary.

[GH2001]

Amen.

Article was spot on. As I said in another thread, I dont even think WE (as Auburn fans) realized what a freak he was last year and what a talent we had at our disposal. We knew he was special, but this guy is on pace to go down as one of the best to ever play the game, at any level...EVER.