Heisman Trust: Integrity 'erroneously omitted' from Mission Statement

After the words "with integrity" disappeared from the Heisman Trust's mission statement, Trust president William J. Dockery said the phrase was "erroneously omitted," and it has since been reinserted.

The Heisman Trophy Trust "erroneously omitted" the word "integrity" from the Heisman Mission Statement, the Trust's president told SI.com on Saturday.

William J. Dockery told SI.com that "integrity" was mistakenly left out of the first line of the Mission Statement during the Heisman Trust's website redesign, which launched earlier this month. The Trust has since added the word back into the statement's first sentence.

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"The Trust created a new website on October 1, 2014 which required extensive input of information and materials by staff," Dockery wrote in an email. "During the website creation process 'integrity' was erroneously omitted from the Trust mission statement by staff without Trust authorization. This omission has been corrected."

For years the first line of the Heisman's Mission Statement had read, "The Heisman Memorial Trophy annually recognizes the outstanding college football player whose performance best exhibits the pursuit of excellence with integrity." But on Friday SI.com reported that the words "with integrity" were no longer included in that line on the Heisman's updated website. Those two words had become fodder for debate in recent years due to off-field incidents and allegations surrounding Heisman winners Jameis Winston, Johnny Manziel and Cam Newton.