Why Darian Mensah is my Heisman pick

Miami opens its season at Stanford, and my Heisman pick is Darian Mensah.

That’s a projection built as much on Miami as the quarterback. The Hurricanes went 13-3 last season, finished 6-2 in ACC play and enter 2026 ranked No. 7 in both preseason polls. Mensah walks into a team positioned near the front of the national race.

I strongly lean toward Mensah over CJ Carr and Arch Manning, the only two players ahead of him in the odds market when I made the pick. I believe he has an opportunity to become the best quarterback Mario has had at Miami, including Cam Ward.

Two years ago, Miami averaged 43 points per game with Ward. Mensah gets an offensive line I expect to become a strength, a deep receiver room and a group of tailbacks inside Shannon Dawson’s offense. Cooper Barkate came with him, and Elija Lofton gives Miami another potential impact player at tight end. The Hurricanes don’t need to invent a structure around their new quarterback. They need him to operate one with enough personnel to keep defenses from building the game plan around one matchup.

Miami has enough options to create favorable throws rather than asking Mensah to rescue bad downs all afternoon.

Ward played in an offense that reached 43 points per game, so the scoring territory I’m describing has existed at Miami under this staff. The question is whether a roster I like better around Mensah can push him beyond what Ward produced there.

We get the first look Friday, Sept. 4, when Miami visits Stanford at 9 p.m. ET.

Miami goes to Clemson on Oct. 3, and Nov. 7 at Notre Dame is the night that matters most for this pick. By then, the early production will either have put Mensah in the center of the race or left him chasing it. A major road performance in November can carry everything that came before it into the final month.

That combination is why Darian Mensah remains my strong lean to win the Heisman.

— JP