Jameis Winston's all-time blunder seals Florida State's humiliating Rose Bowl fate
PASADENA, Calif. – Two years of great escapes ended in eight ghastly seconds for Jameis Winston.
On fourth-and-5 at the Oregon 30-yard line, with Florida State trailing 39-20 and Winston trying to engineer one more comeback in a long string of them, he dropped back to pass. As had been the case most of the game, he had all day. Eight seconds is an eternity for a quarterback.
But Winston was gripped by indecision. He scanned the field. He chopped his feet. He started skittering around the pocket in confusion.
Finally, after reverse pivoting away from Oregon linebacker Tyson Coleman and end DeForest Buckner, Winston pulled up to throw. And slipped on the Rose Bowl grass, lurching backward. And as he brought the ball up to throw before falling down, he somehow flipped it over his head for a cataclysmic, game-ending, winning-streak-snapping and likely college career-ending comeuppance.
This was yet another mess of Winston’s own making – and this one finally cost the most polarizing college football player in memory. The fumble was so slapstick stunning, the official nearest the play fell over like Winston. The loose ball was returned 58 yards for a touchdown by Tony Washington – a third lightning-strike touchdown in a span of 5 minutes and 7 seconds – and the Seminoles’ fate was sealed.
There was no coming back from that. And the hubristic impact of the climactic play was straight out of Sophocles. If karma wanted to deliver a humbling haymaker for Winston, this was it.
Everyone rooting for Famous Jameis to finally fail got their wish, right then and there. After a Heisman Trophy, a national title, 27 straight wins and enough controversy to exhaust nearly everyone, his run was done.
In a result that had a rather high approval rating across America, Oregon destroyed Florida State 59-20 in a College Football Playoff semifinal. A team coach Jimbo Fisher repeatedly lauded for its grit, character and resilience coming back against ACC competition showed none when finally faced with a superior opponent. When the going got truly tough, the Seminoles folded – giving up the most points in Rose Bowl history. They collapsed in a torrent of turnovers – five in the game, all of them converted into touchdowns by the relentless Ducks. This was such a mismatch that Fisher lifted Winston for the final FSU possessions because the game was so far out of reach.
And when it was over, about 75 percent of the Seminoles jogged directly off the field without shaking hands with the Ducks. Some character. That will be the latest head-shaking behavior for Fisher to explain away.
Among the few Florida State players who did shake hands was Winston. He was deeply stung by the first and likely last defeat of his college career, but he congratulated Oregon and then answered all questions in the postgame press conference.
On the disastrous, game-sealing play: “I was just trying to make a play. I should have got the ball in my hands earlier. Just – it was an unfortunate play, man. I never thought that I would slip, throw the ball backwards. …That’s probably going to be on ‘C’mon Man’ or something. That was crazy.”
There was no choice but to own that fiasco. But Winston is so stubbornly competitive that he couldn’t bring himself to admit that Oregon was the better team. Or even to acknowledge that Oregon won.
“If everybody in this room just want to be real with themselves, this game could have went either way,” he said. “We turned the ball over a lot. We beat ourself. Just be real with yourself right now. We beat ourself.”
This, apparently, was the first-ever 39-point blowout that could have gone either way. It’s true that Florida State had several self-inflicted wounds – none more self-inflicted than Winston’s fumble – but the Seminoles never showed any ability to stop the Oregon offense. The Noles couldn’t launch one of their trademark comebacks because they couldn’t get any stops when it mattered.
“It was never over,” Winston insisted. “Honestly, it was never over. We just got beat, turned the ball over too many times. But it still ain’t over yet. We can go and play again, honest.”
No, you can’t – even though Winston wore his football pants and shoulder pads to the postgame press conference, as if hoping someone would declare a do-over. Nobody did.
Game over. Season over. College career likely over, although neither Winston nor Fisher were ready to discuss his football future Thursday night.
“He’s a tremendous player, tremendous competitor, tremendous person,” Fisher said. “Have to wait and see what the future holds.”
Said Winston: “It hurts badder than whatever you can imagine, but the good thing is we live to fight another day. We’ve got tons of great futures. No one likes to lose, man. I mean, losing is really not in my vocabulary, to be honest with you, but we fell short today. Got to man up and just get better every day. I just hope we can learn from this because I ain’t felt this way in a long time, I’ve got to say. So that’s something to smile on.”
But there were no smiles from No. 5 after the game. Not in the press conference, and not after he returned to the Rose Bowl locker room.
Most of the Seminoles had showered, dressed and headed to the bus by the time the golf cart brought Winston and defensive lineman Mario Edwards Jr. back to the locker room. As the last players trickled out and the media was ushered out, Winston slowly and silently removed his Florida State uniform.
Probably for the last time. Then it will be up to the NFL to decide what to make of Famous Jameis.
If this was his last act, it ended with a profound comeuppance. After two years of escaping everything that came at him, an eight-second karmic comedy of self-inflicted error brought down the curtain.
