Ohio State's Heisman Campaign for Jeremiah Smith Is a Tell, Not a Coronation
The consensus formed in about a day: Ohio State launched an official Heisman campaign for Jeremiah Smith, so Jeremiah Smith must be the Heisman frontrunner. Eleven Warriors reported the “JJ 4 It All” push. WFAA's Locked On Columbus segment carried the school's framing — Ohio State is backing Smith as the best player in the country and putting real resources behind the claim.
Take the opposite read. Schools do not buy advertising for a player who is already winning. They buy it for a player who is losing an argument he should be winning.
The campaign's own name is the giveaway
“JJ 4 It All.” The numeral is his jersey. The “It All” is doing the real work, and Eleven Warriors spelled it out in the headline: the campaign is for the Heisman Trophy and other national awards. That is not the grammar of a coronation. That is the grammar of a hedge.
If Ohio State's athletic department believed the Heisman was coming, the campaign would be about the Heisman — singular, full stop. Instead it is a portfolio. The Maxwell. The receiver hardware. Whatever else the school can put in front of a voter before the ballots close. A campaign that lists several prizes has told you which one it thinks is a long shot, and it is the one with the statue.
Notice, too, what the school is actually claiming. WFAA's framing is that Ohio State backs Smith as the best player — not as the most valuable, not as the most outstanding, not as the quarterback of an undefeated team. “Best player” is the argument you make to the Maxwell Club and to voters who rank talent rather than value. It is a subtly different pitch than the one that wins the Heisman, and the school is making both at once because it has to.
The Maxwell release is the more honest document
Three days of headlines, and the most informative one is the driest: Ohio State's own athletics site announcing that Smith was named a semifinalist for the Maxwell Award. Semifinalist. Not finalist.
The Maxwell is voted on by the Maxwell Football Club, not by the school, and it goes to the college player of the year. It is the electorate most receptive to a receiver winning a player-of-the-year prize. And even there, in mid-November, Smith is on a list rather than at the top of one. That is the actual state of the race, published by the people who most want him to win it.
Now the fair version: the consensus isn't baseless
Steelman it. The Maxwell semifinalist nod came from an outside body, not a press release, and that is a real vote of confidence. The old “a receiver can't win the Heisman” rule has genuinely softened — DeVonta Smith won it in 2020, and Travis Hunter won it in 2024 as a two-way player. Ohio State has run this exact play before for a receiver: the Marvin Harrison Jr. push in 2023 got him to New York as a finalist. He didn't win, but the school proved it can move a receiver into the room.
And Smith's own case is not manufactured. He is, by his school's assessment and by the Maxwell Club's, among the best players in the sport. Nobody in Columbus is inventing a candidate out of nothing.
The problem a campaign cannot fix
The Heisman electorate is regional, deadline-driven and — this is the part campaigns can't touch — mostly watching quarterbacks. A quarterback's case fits in one line of a box score. A receiver's case requires you to have actually watched the game. Voters who didn't watch default to the stat line they can read in six seconds. That is the structural headwind, and it does not care how good the graphic design is.
There is also a calendar problem. November campaigns are for candidates who need a late shove, not for frontrunners protecting a lead. Frontrunners spend November trying not to get hurt. The moment a school starts buying billboards, it has conceded that the voters' default is somebody else.
The receivers who have won it show how narrow the path is: Johnny Rodgers in 1972, Tim Brown in 1987, Desmond Howard in 1991, DeVonta Smith in 2020. Rodgers and Howard were return men as much as receivers. Smith played on an undefeated team in a season with no ambiguity about who the best player in the country was. Every one of them needed a story bigger than the position.
A school-funded campaign is not that story. It's a press release with a budget.
What would actually tell you he's winning
Ignore the campaign. Watch the cuts. Semifinalist to finalist for the Maxwell is the next gate, and if he clears it, the “most decorated player in the country” argument becomes available — that is the only receiver argument that has ever worked. Watch whether the Heisman finalist invitations include him; a receiver in the room is a real achievement and still not the trophy. Watch whether opposing coaches start volunteering his name without being asked. That is the signal that travels to voters who never turn on a Big Ten broadcast.
And watch the order of the hardware. If he collects the Maxwell and the receiver awards, the Heisman conversation changes shape in December, because the case stops being about position and starts being about a trophy case. If he doesn't, the campaign was what campaigns usually are: a school telling voters what it hopes, not what it knows.
The useful takeaway is narrow. When a school launches a trophy campaign, don't read it as a prediction. Read it as a complaint — Ohio State is telling you, in marketing language, that the default outcome of this race beats its guy unless somebody intervenes. The intervention is the campaign. The fact that it was necessary is the story.
Common questions
Did Ohio State launch an official Heisman campaign for Jeremiah Smith?
Yes. Eleven Warriors reported the school launched a campaign called “JJ 4 It All,” and WFAA's Locked On Columbus segment covered Ohio State backing Smith as the best player in the country. The campaign is explicitly for the Heisman Trophy and other national awards, not the Heisman alone.
Is Jeremiah Smith a Maxwell Award semifinalist?
Yes. Ohio State's official athletics site announced on November 10, 2026 that Smith was named a semifinalist for the Maxwell Award, which is voted on by the Maxwell Football Club and goes to the college player of the year.
Does the campaign mean Smith is the Heisman favorite?
Not necessarily. A school-run campaign is evidence that the school thinks its player needs help with voters, not that he already has their votes. The campaign's own name groups the Heisman with several other awards, and Smith is a Maxwell semifinalist rather than a finalist — both suggest he is in the conversation rather than leading it.
Can a wide receiver win the Heisman Trophy?
It has happened, but rarely and usually with a story bigger than the position. Johnny Rodgers (1972), Tim Brown (1987), Desmond Howard (1991) and DeVonta Smith (2020) are the receivers who have won it. Rodgers and Howard also returned kicks, and Smith played on an undefeated team.