On Wednesdsay, Kuechly was named to yet another college football award preseason watch list. Yawn. This time it was the Rotary Lombardi Award preseason watch list, which has a rather unique eligibility criteria:
"Eligibility for the Rotary Lombardi Award is limited to down linemen, end-to-end, either on offense of defense, who set up no farther than 10 yards to the left or right of the ball, and linebackers who set up no father than five yards deep from the line of scrimmage."
Got that?
In short, the Rotary Lombardi is awarded annually to the best college football lineman or linebacker (why couldn't they just say this in the first place?).
Kuechly joins 17 other ACC players on this year's preseason watch list. Of those 17, 11 are on the defensive side of the ball, including Nigel Bradham (Florida State), Audie Cole (N.C. State), Sean Spence (Miami) and Bruce Taylor (Virginia Tech) at linebacker.
The preseason list of 125 (!) will be whittled down to 12 semifinalists for 2011. The 42nd Rotary Lombardi Award will be held on December 6-7, 2011 at Reliant Center in Houston. More information at www.rotarylombardiaward.org.