As he began his senior season at Penn State in 1999, of course LaVar Arrington believed he could win the Heisman Trophy. It went to the nation’s best college football player, by his reckoning. Also by his reckoning, Arrington was the nation’s best college football player, at least this side of Florida State receiver Peter Warrick.

But he also felt he took some public, early-season shots about freelancing from Nittany Lions coach Joe Paterno. And then Wisconsin’s Ron Dayne began stampeding through defenses en route to the NCAA’s career rushing record.

Before September was out, Arrington knew he would receive a stiff arm in the wrong way.