USC Football: Has NCAA Football 13 Shortchanged Matt Barkley?

US PRESSWIRE

EA Sports turned Tuesday into Christmas for college football junkies, as NCAA Football 13 was released on XBox 360 and Playstation 3. With Matt Barkley being the odds-on favorite to win the 2012 Heisman Trophy in real life, one would have to imagine that the virtual Matt would be an out-of-this-world talent. But according to a few sources, that might not be the case.

Mind you that we here at Reign of Troy are still in the dark ages of gaming and keep re-straining our thumbs to John David Booty on Playstation 2. Therefore, we’ll have to defer to former USC Trojan, Brandon Carswell, who played alongside Matt Barkley for three seasons.

Now, we’ll refrain from comment on whether or not Barkley’s arm could ever be classified as ‘poo sauce’, but after browsing through Adam Kramer’s article on Bleacher Report regarding a total sim of the 2012 season via NCAA Football 13, there really could be something to it.

According to Kramer, the sim’s five finalists for the Heisman Trophy featured three Pac-12 players, neither of which were blonde nor named Barkley. De’Anthony Thomas was projected as the winner, with Washington’s Keith Price finishing second and Utah’s John White IV coming up fourth. The other finalists? Kansas State’s Collin Klein and Arkansas State’s Ryan Aplin. No Barkley.

In the simulation, Aplin threw for just 2,741 yards and 27 touchdowns, but added 801 yards on the ground, which is RGIII-esque in terms of running. But does that really make Virtual Aplin’s season in the Sun Belt Conference better than Virtual Barkley’s in the Pac-12?

Cyber Matt threw for over three thousand yards and 38 touchdowns with just four picks, for an 11-2 USC team. CGI Keith Price had a great season too, but had similar passing numbers to Aplin and his rushing yardage put him at just 330 yards, despite apparently sneaking his way to 11 scores and taking UW to their first Rose Bowl appearance in over a decade.

So is NCAA 13 becoming progressive and disregarding team performance in terms of deciding on a Heisman Trophy winner, or is there some actual merit to Barkley’s decreased attributes? You’ll have to answer this one for us in the comments. And for the record, we’ll take the real Barkley over the simulated Barkley any day of the week. Now, go grab your remotes, nerds.