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By Tyler Everett
Sports Betting Editor
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The first full Saturday of the 2025 college football season is still 45 days away, but it's not too early to talk about the 2025 Heisman Trophy odds.
We're starting our series on how to bet on the 2025 Heisman Trophy race with an in-depth look at the case for and against early betting favorite Arch Manning.
Keep an eye on Newsweek Sports Betting in the weeks ahead for similar pieces on each of the 2025 Heisman favorites as we wrap up July and head into August.
2025 Heisman Trophy Betting Odds
Below are the odds as of July 16 to win this year's Heisman Trophy at DraftKings, FanDuel and bet365.
The 12 contenders below all boast 30-to-1 odds across the board.
Before we go any further, let's note that this time last year, oddsmakers saw Oregon's Dillon Gabriel and Georgia's Carson Beck as the co-favorites, followed by Quinn Ewers, Jalen Milroe and Jaxson Dart.
Of those five, only Gabriel ended up getting invited to New York as a finalist -- and he finished a distant third behind winner Travis Hunter and runner-up Ashton Jeanty.
Beck, Ewers, Milroe and Dart all failed to crack the top 10 in the 2024 Heisman Trophy vote. Trendy 2024 preseason Heisman darkhorse candidates Nico Iamaleava and Will Howard also ended up being non-factors, as eventual winner Hunter emerged as one of the favorites before Halloween.
Arch Manning Opens As Heisman Trophy Favorite
We're starting our summer Heisman preview series with the biggest name in college football right now.
We're referring, of course, to the No. 1 high school recruit in the class of 2023: Texas QB Arch Manning. Peyton and Eli's famous nephew has been in the spotlight since years before he committed to coach Steve Sarkisian and the Longhorns back in June of 2022.
For one quick example of what we mean we call Manning "the biggest name in college football," check out the crowd he drew at SEC Media Days in Atlanta earlier this week.
Given that the hype around Manning dates all the way back to his middle school days, it's no suprise that he's getting early Heisman love.
Manning himself, however, said this week that he knows he has a ton to prove.
Arch Manning Heisman Trophy Betting Analysis
Let's start with biggest, most obvious question regarding Manning: Should a player with 95 career passes and two starts to his name really be the favorite ahead of the likes of Garrett Nussmeier, Cade Klubnik and Drew Allar?
Each of those three have attempted at least 700 passes in their career.
It's hard to overstate the importance of experience at Manning's position. With that in mind, see below for a breakdown of how experienced the most recent recipients of this award were entering their Heisman-winning campaigns.
Spoiler: no, extensive prior experience is not a necessity, per se.
How Will Arch Manning Fare Against Texas's Schedule?
The (in)experience issue is just one of a few burning questions regarding Manning's potential to win the top individual award in college sports.
The first pressing question for Manning and the Horns has to do with the difficulty of their 2025 schedule, which is the fourth-hardest in the country, according to ESPN's FPI.
They hardly had it "easy" in their first year in the SEC, as they finished with the sixth-best strength of schedule, per ESPN's FPI. Avoiding Tennessee, Ole Miss and Alabama -- and getting Georgia in Austin in the regular season -- certainly helped, though.
With Week 2 foe Michigan stumbling throughout a disappointing national title defense, the toughest road game of 2024 for the Horns ended up being their regular-season finale vs. Texas A&M, which finished 8-5 (5-3 SEC).
Texas opens this season in Columbus against reigning champ Ohio State, and it also has to visit Florida (Oct. 4) and Georgia (Nov. 15).
Something tells me that at least one of those teams -- all of whom currently have among the 15 shortest national title odds in the country, per DraftKings -- will finish the season in the top 25. Remarkably, none of UT's road foes finished in the final AP poll of 2024.
This year, the trips to Columbus, Gainesville and Athens alone could be enough to make it tough for Manning to meet his sky-high expectations.
He will, however, have some prime opportunities to put up huge numbers. After the OSU game in Week 1, he gets a three-game home stretch from Sept. 6-20 against San Jose State, UTEP and Sam Houston.
The other good news for Manning and Co. is that three of their last four regular-season games will take place at Darrell K Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium in Austin: Nov. 1 vs. Vanderbilt, Nov. 22 vs. Arkansas and Nov. 28 vs. Texas A&M.
Can Arch Manning Do A Better Job Avoiding Sacks?
Manning's passing numbers a year ago (61-for-90 for 939 yards, with 9 TDs and 2 interceptions) didn't leave much to be desired.
He still needs to prove he can effectively navigate the pocket, though, especially against elite defenses.
In the four midseason appearances in 2024 that accounted for both of his starts and the bulk of his meaningful reps, Manning was sacked a total of six times in 84 dropbacks vs. UTSA, UL-Monroe*, Mississippi State* and Georgia, including at least once in each of those contests.
That includes two sacks in just eight dropbacks in his appearance vs. UGA, who also limited him to -1 rushing yard on 4 attempts.
There's a ton of room for improvement on this front after Manning was sacked on over 7 percent of his dropbacks last year. His issues avoiding the pass rush came despite playing behind an offensive line that featured a top-10 pick at left tackle (Kelvin Banks Jr.) and sixth-round picks at guard (Hayden Conner) and right tackle (Cameron Williams).
*Manning got his two career starts to date in the ULM and MSU games as Quinn Ewers was sidelined with an injury.
Can An Inexperienced QB Win The Heisman Trophy?
Before we dive into the recent Heisman-winning QBs' varying degrees of experience, it's worth noting that Texas is replacing not only Banks Jr., Conner and Williams up front, but also leading receiver Matthew Golden, tight end Gunnar Helm and running back Jaydon Blue.
The latter three were all taken in the the first five rounds of the 2025 NFL Draft.
The Longhorns have recently proven their ability to reload. Case in point: from 2023 to 2024, they lost a slew of talent (two Texas wide receivers, a running back and a tight end were taken in the first four rounds of the 2024 NFL Draft), but still averaged 34.5 points per game last year.
But the history of Heisman Trophy-winning quarterbacks over the last decade makes me skeptical of Manning.
Bryce Young won the award in 2021 in his second year in Tuscaloosa and first as Bama's starter. But of the last seven quarterbacks who won the Heisman Trophy, below is a rundown of each one's career pass attempts (PA) entering their Heisman-winning campaign.
Suffice it to say, Young looks like the exception to the rule over the last decade:
The table above shows that it's not necessary to have as much experience as Daniels did entering the 2023 season for LSU or even as many reps as Burrow (2019) and Mayfield (2017) had entering their senior seasons. Still, the data above backs up anyone under the assumption that Manning's lack of experience doesn't bode well for his 2025 Heisman chances.
Young is not, however, the only inexperienced QB to win this award in the last 15 years, as Jameis Winston (2013) and Johnny Manziel (2012) also won the Heisman as redshirt freshmen.
Buy Or Sell: Arch Manning To Win 2025 Heisman
Best available: +700 at FanDuel as of July 16, 2025
Sell
Given all the questions around Manning in his first season running the Texans offense, a bet on him at 7-to-1 to win the Heisman doesn't make much sense right now.
For the record, my current skepticism of Manning has more to do with how rarely betting on preseason Heisman favorites works out than any doubts I have about the current betting favorite to go No. 1 in the 2026 NFL Draft.
FWIW, Manning is currently the favorite at +225 at DraftKings in that market, just ahead of Drew Allar at +275.
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