Brandon Allen is Arkansas to the core.
The Hogs' fifth-year senior quarterback grew up in Fayetteville, Arkansas, played his high school football at Fayetteville High School and started watching Hogs games from the sideline when he was in the first grade, a fringe benefit of his father being an Arkansas assistant coach. Bobby Allen is in his 18th season as a member of Arkansas' staff, and all his middle son has ever known is Woo Pig Sooie.
So maybe all this explains why it cut everyone in the family to the core when Allen was sledgehammered by the kind of nasty fan commentary that would bring even the most hardened of NFL veterans to their knees.
Fans trashing Allen on internet message boards and the radio were just part of the ordeal. His truck was egged following a loss to Mississippi State during his sophomore season. That next summer, his truck was set ablaze in the early-morning hours and destroyed, one of three car fires in the area that authorities investigated as arson. His apartment was also broken into last year.
"To play quarterback in this league, you better have thick skin," said Allen, who just happens to be one of the hottest quarterbacks in the country right now. "Fans want success immediately, and they're going to be up and down. But as a quarterback, you can't ride the highs and the lows. You have to keep an even keel, stay level-headed and stay within yourself no matter what's going on around you."
Allen, an Honor Roll student who already has his degree, is quick to take the high road when asked how bad some of the criticism got. He prefers to talk about how far this team has come this season after starting 1-4. The Hogs have won four of their last five, including three in a row, and Allen is on the kind of tear most quarterbacks only dream about.
He's led the Hogs to touchdowns on 14 of their last 20 drives, and they've scored on all five overtime possessions and are 3-for-3 in two-point conversions in their last two overtime wins. Over his last nine quarters of regulation action, he's completed 72.8 percent of his passes for 825 yards, 10 touchdowns and no interceptions. The Hogs haven't gone three-and-out with Allen at quarterback in their last 23 drives.
"It's no different than when I was thrown into the fire as a sophomore," said Allen, who leads the SEC with a 164.7 passing efficiency and ranks ninth nationally. "The quarterback always gets too much of the credit when you're winning and too much of the blame when you're losing. It takes a special person to play quarterback in this league."
His coach at Arkansas, Bret Bielema, says Allen has been special, period, both as a person and quarterback, and is a major reason the Hogs have turned it around this season as they try to make it four in a row Saturday when they travel to LSU (7:15 p.m. ET, ESPN).
"He's the definition of perseverance, for sure, because some of the stuff got personal," Bielema said. "Sometimes with these hometown kids, they have it twice as bad because everybody knows them and everybody's always asking about them. I know it was very rough on Brandon, probably more than any of us could imagine."
Some of the things said about Allen on radio call-in shows and internet message boards would have stung any football player. Among other things, they said he wasn't clutch, couldn't get it done in big games and wasn't a winner.
And to be fair, every school has its fringe element, but Arkansas radio personality Bo Mattingly said it was almost as if Allen became the target of blame for everything that had gone wrong with the Arkansas program since the Bobby Petrino scandal.
"It's as bad as I've ever seen a quarterback treated," said Mattingly, who hosts a popular statewide show. "There was a vocal segment of fans who thought Brandon Allen did not have what it took to play quarterback at this level. He was referred to as a loser more than once by callers on our show. They thought he was missing the 'it' factor."
During those times, Allen leaned on his teammates, and on the lessons he'd learned as part of a football family. Having grown up in Fayetteville, Allen understood the fishbowl he was living in.
"He's a tough kid, and he's been mentally tough," said father Bobby Allen, who's now Arkansas's director of high school and NFL relations. "We talked as a family. People are entitled to their opinions, and they're going to express them. You can't take any of it personally and keep going out there and doing the best job you can. Brandon has done that, and I'm proud of the way he's held everything in and just kept pushing ahead.
"The coaches have done a great job of continuing to believe in him. The team's playing behind him, and good things are starting to happen."
Allen was never close to being healthy as a sophomore, but he gutted it out in a disappointing 3-9 season. That was Bielema's first season in Fayetteville, and the Hogs were 4-8 the year before in John L. Smith's only season.
"I think Brandon maybe felt the weight of the world on him a little bit," Bielema said. "I just wanted to make sure he knew that we believed in him and knew what he was capable of. I never wavered in the media about him. I've learned that. If the media thinks you've got one ounce of concern about the quarterback, they'll pounce on it. I just kept saying to him, 'Don't worry about us. Do what you have to do.'"
Allen would love to have a few plays back. What quarterback wouldn't? Four of the Hogs' six losses last season were by a touchdown or less. And then this season, they moved up and down the field against Toledo in the second week, but only found the end zone once and fell 16-12. They also failed to finish the game for the second year in a row against Texas A&M and lost in overtime.
"We lost so many close games, and for a while, it seemed like we just couldn't get over the hump," Allen said. "You strive to make the big plays. You want to make all the throws. But even when you don't, you have to come back and find a way to win the game. That's what being a quarterback is about. Whether that's being clutch or not, I don't know. I just know I've always been there for this team and done everything I could to try and help us win."
Allen has thrown 41 touchdown passes and only 10 interceptions in his last two seasons, the kind of ratio any coach would love to have. He and his receivers are on the same page like never before. Junior receivers Drew Morgan and Dominique Reed are catching everything, and first-year offensive coordinator/quarterbacks coach Dan Enos has also helped Allen to take it to another level.
It's not out of the realm of possibility that Allen could get some All-SEC consideration at quarterback, especially if he keeps up his current pace and the Hogs continue to win. And Mel Kiper said he thinks Allen has a chance to be drafted, possibly as high as the fifth round. But the only thing on Allen's mind now is finishing the season strong.
His redemption will come in the form of more wins.
"We're just trying to ride this train out," Allen said.
And even some of his harshest critics have to be impressed with the guy riding shotgun right now.