Ten years ago, Washington State athletic department employees spent a day on campus picking up fallen leaves.
Each leaf went into an envelope and each envelope went to someone WSU knew or suspected to be a Heisman Trophy voter. There was nothing else in the envelope, no letter, no pamphlet, no photo.
Just like that, the Ryan Leaf-for-Heisman campaign was born.
Flash forward a decade, and again a quarterback from the Northwest has come flying out of the periphery and into consideration for the award, given annually to the player the Heisman voters pick as the best in college football.
Oregon's Dennis Dixon jumped to second this week on the ESPN.com Heisman watch list, behind Boston College quarterback Matt Ryan.
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