Why I Think "NFL Guys" Hate Tim Tebow
by mlmintampa on Feb 24, 2010 4:48 PM EST
in Football
14 comments
There has been a lovely pissing match on this series of tubes over this question, "Should Florida have taught Tim Tebow to be a pro-style quarterback?" In one corner, the ink stained fingers of the Palm Beach Post's Ben Volin and Orlando Sentinel's Mike Bianchi. In the other corner, Pro Football Talk's Mike Florio and your ESPN's cavalcade of stars, Mel Kiper and Todd McShay.
First off, criticism of Tebow and any college player is valid. College football has a tendency to glorify guys, who only end up as great players because they played with 10 other great guys. Perhaps Tebow is one of those guys. After all, Bubba Caldwell, Percy Harvin and Lou Murphy are productive pros and the Pounceys, Riley Cooper and Aaron Hernandez will be decent draft picks too. Maybe Tebow benefited from playing with them, not the other way around.
Secondly, if you read Florio's take on the situation, it has the air of someone tossing knowledge out of his digital ivory tower. Since he is an NFL guy, he is the smartest guy in the room. And even though he throws around rumors as fact, Florio has the moral high ground to criticize Volin and accuse him of being a mouthpiece for the UF program. While Volin defends the UF program and Tebow, he can't go far in that argument since he is, you know, a real reporter. (Or maybe he doesn't want to go far, too.) Bianchi, as a columnist, can take it further, basically saying that the only responsibility Florida's coaches have is to win games. If UF could win with Tebow throwing right handed, they would let him.
However, Florio's strafing ultimately reveals his real argument; Tim Tebow does not look, taste, smell or feel like an NFL quarterback. The NFL wants quarterbacks who look like Jimmy Clausen and Jevon Snead. According to NFL guys, Tebow is a failure because he not a pro-style quarterback.
Florio is lucky that the NFL has not had the revolution that Baseball has had with Moneyball and Sabermetrics finding ways to assess players outside of the blonde 6-foot-3 guy who, "just looks like a player." After the Oakland A's rebuilt their team and became successful, every MLB team copied it. The philosophy worked so well that after the Boston Red Sox used it to rebuild their team, they won two World Series in four years. The NFL, a league that thinks the Wildcat is innovative, is not a creative league. Teams are successful by copying the West Coast Offense or Tampa 2, not creating their own system with players uniquely designed for it.
I don't want to say NFL guys like Florio, Kiper and McShay are intellectually lazy, but they are not creative. In their mind, it is impossible for a great athlete to be a quarterback. It is impossible to rebuild your throwing motion or get faster or stronger. If your 40-time is not right, or you don't have enough reps at 225, or your mother was a maid and your father was a drunk, you cannot play in their league. Fit in this box and maybe we can let you play in the NFL. There is something else at stake; if Tebow starts putting up numbers, Florio and the rest of them are failures. So are every general manager who passed up the greatest college football player of his generation. After all, they're all so smart, they should have seen in coming. Just like Kiper on JaMarcus Russell. Oh, wait, bad example.
I'm not trying to defend Tebow or make the claim that he is going to be a great quarterback. After all, he could suck. But the meme that somehow Urban Meyer or Tebow should have fixed the loop in his throw is garbage. They wanted to win games, not look pretty. Obviously, to play in the NFL, Florio and the rest of his NFL guys think you have to look pretty. Tebow will never be pretty and they will all hate him for it.
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Interesting...
Maybe the concept of “good enough” is lazy. I mean, sure: Tebow was good enough to win plenty at UF. That said, maybe things could have been better if they had simply tried to make him as good as possible. I’m not talking about snaps from under center, but improving his motion and progressions would have helped. Also, pushing Tebow to get better would be a great tone setter for the team as a whole. I dunno about all this…
MileHighReport.com member since 02/06/07, promoted to "Position Coach" (i.e. new staff writer) on 02/16/10!
I don't care what horrible excuses for scouts say,
I’m backing Tebow all the way, he’s the greatest football player of all time and it seems only us know that’s true. But, it’s annoying to see analysts diss him and compliment Clausen, Bradford, those guys from Stanford, Bowling Green, and Michigan State that hardly won anything.
Any time
Only “us” know something to be true, you might want to take a harder look at what it is you are so sure about.
They aren’t dissing him so much as saying his mechanics don’t fit the NFL’s prototype. That’s not false. His mechanics were acceptable for college, and maybe even better for college, and possibly part of the reason why he became the greatest college QB in at least this generation.
It’s not like they are insulting his character or anything. It’s their job to comment on players ability to play NFL style football, if they don’t think he can play, that’s what they are going to say. They aren’t going to sugarcoat it just because he’s a great guy and did well in college.
by Grinder in Training on Feb 25, 2010 1:59 PM EST up reply actions
Tebow was indeed beautiful as the UF quarterback.
He is also a beautiful person. He more than fulfilled his obligation as a scholar athlete in the collegiate arena and he owes nothing to sports fans at this point. Should he enter into a contractual agreement with a pro team, he will owe them something. Until that time comes, Tim can basically tell the world to kiss his ass. He is a champion and a once in a lifetime hero for all sports fans to appreciate. Alas, Tim is too much of a gentleman to tell you to kiss his ass. I, however am not. Kiss Tim’s ass. All the other chickenshit, whining, bedraggled, ass stomped SEC fans that have had nothing to do for the last few years but hate Tim Tebow can now….kiss his ass. He’ll make his money and leave the NFL some day and then you can kiss his ass again. Do ya hate Tebow? Well guess what.
Even those two nfl players that came out and said tebow can't throw will be wrong.
The guy that will disappoint in the nfl will be Sam Bradford. Injured twice in last years college football season (by one player each time) What will happen when he gets hit by two stronger nfl defensive ends. This guy will end up like Ken dorsey. I hope the Redskins are dumb enough to take him too.
I'm all about covering the spread and moneylines. I was building a house, I don't deserve this, deserves have nothing to do with it. Bang. "Unforgiven" I drink your milkshake. I drink it up! "There Will BE Blood"
by wolfmanshowlforever on Feb 25, 2010 4:27 PM EST up reply actions
Urban Meyer was hired to win games
If you take the focus off of that and put it on player development for the NFL, college football simply becomes the minor leagues. To take the importance of winning is to devalue the game. Nobody would want to watch a sport in which the entire goal was to become worthy of the highest draft pick to the next level. Sure, we love to see our college guys successful at the next level, and its a great thing to be able to pitch to recruits. But at the end of the day, we want to win. In a sport in which so much money is involved and awarded to the successful teams, it’s absolutely ludicrous to say that a program’s focus should be anything other than being as successful as possible and bringing pride to its fans.
It’s up to the individual player to prioritize for themselves. If a guy dreams of being an NFL quarterback and that is his sole focus, then he shouldn’t go to Texas Tech and play in a dumbed down system that in no way prepares him. I really doubt that Urban Meyer ever told Tebow during his recruitment “Come to UF and we’ll make you the #1 draft pick in 4 years.” I think he said something along the lines of, “Come to UF and we’ll win championships,” which he did. Coaches only have an obligation to develop the best NFL QB that they can if they promise that they will during recruiting. The NFL is mostly about tools, and the guys that have them will be drafted the highest. I don’t think Tebow currently does, but the blame for that shouldn’t be laid anywhere near Meyer.
>>---l>
Great points
As a Gator, I wish our former players well in the NFL. But I don’t care nearly as much about how well they do there as I care about their performance in college. Why would UF spend a ton of time changing Tebow’s throwing motion and footwork? Didn’t he complete 65% or so of his passes already? Would they need him to complete the other 35% too (if you take away Cooper’s drops, he’d be well on his way already!). Tebow came to UF to win championships and that is what he did. He was a perfect fit for UF’s spread system and he became a football legend.
I don’t know what he’ll do in the NFL, and neither do any of these ass clowns like Kyper and McShay. But if he would have gone to a school with a pro-style offense, I don’t think we’d even be talking about him right now. Tebow brought a new dimension to the game and it is up to whatever NFL team drafts him to utilize that extra dimension. He’s never going to develop into a Elway or Marino type pocket passer. That’s just not who he is, so it is silly for people to say he won’t be successful because he doesn’t possess that particular skill set. He will be successful if he gets drafted by a team that can use the abilities he has.
a bit off topic but Tebow related
I just read a short blip online saying Tebow has decided not to participate in ANY of the drills at the NFL Combine. He’s not going to run the 40, not doing the bench press, not doing agility drills, nothing.
Any Florida folks know why that’s the case?
Pretty common
For the high (or hopefully high) draft picks. They will do all those things at their pro day, where it’s a more controlled environment and they can do it under their own terms. When your career and millions of dollars is riding on it, I can’t blame them.
The combine is really good for those guys who are considered “sleepers”, can make a name for themselves and really stand out. If you are already a big name, which I think we all agree Tebow is, he doesn’t have that same incentive to do the tests at the combine.
Not to mention, it buys him some time to continue working on improving his mechanics.
by Grinder in Training on Feb 25, 2010 2:03 PM EST up reply actions
the throwing I understand
But come on…he can’t run a 40 yard dash?
I don’t think it’s nearly as common as you think it is…I realize guys who are injured don’t participate, but even among top picks I am not away of perfectly healthy players deciding they aren’t going to do ANYTHING at the combine. And considering right now Tebow is considered at best a 2nd round pick (and some are saying he won’t even go that high), I don’t think you can even put him in that elite category of draft picks. Either way, I haven’t heard of any of the other top picks who are perfectly healthy refusing to participate in any of the physical tests. If you have a list of names who have, feel free to provide it.
I just don’t get it. Makes it sound to me like he’s really scared he’s going to underperform. Which raises huge red flags in my mind—if he’s too scared to run a 40 yard dash at the combine, can I really put faith in him to perform at a high level the first time he faces Indy at Indy? Or NO in the Superdome? Or the Pats at Gillette Stadium?
Specifically the 40 yard dash.
I’d be surprised if he did run it, not the other way around. Plenty of big names (and basically all the quarterbacks), but if you’re too lazy to look them up yourself: Matthew Stafford, Michael Crabtree (did not run the 40), Dan LeFevour, Sam Bradford, Jimmy Clausen, Danario Alexander.
Here is a better written explanation of what I said about wanting to do it in their own environment that they can control. Here is the link
http://www.mlive.com/lions/index.ssf/2009/02/i_understand_why_matt_stafford.html
The problem is that the quarterbacks always are throwing to different receivers who all run at different speeds with different route adjustments. In drills where precision is crucial, it’s a big deal
Now, if you’re one of the guys in the middle of the pack — such as Harper — you’re going to throw at the combine because you don’t have much of a choice.
As I said, the sleeper types workout at the combine, not the big names. Just no reason to. Everyone knows who Tim Tebow, Dan LeFevour, Clausen are, why would they risk looking bad throwing to WR’s they don’t know or putting up a bad time in an environment they aren’t comfortable in? I wouldn’t necessarily say they are elite prospects (either LeFevour or Tebow,) but they are well known, which is my point. People are going to go to their pro days and see them, a guy like Flacco or Harper, they might need to show something at the combine.
Think about it this way.. it’s big news that Suh is participating in the combine. That should tell you at least a little about the process.
by Grinder in Training on Feb 26, 2010 10:11 AM EST up reply actions
Quote fail
Seems I should use that handy Preview button in the future.
by Grinder in Training on Feb 26, 2010 10:12 AM EST up reply actions
Tebow scared?
Controlled environment is the issue. it’s ludicrous to think Tebow would be afraid of events like the bench press. He was the second strongest lifter on the Gator’s team (bench press) in his sophmore year. I doubt there is a quarterback candidate in the country that can come close to Tim in that event. As far as the 40, he is no slouch there either. While the NFL linemen and linebackers pursue at an entirely different level, all rookies have to make that adjustment. There are too many intangibles at this point to make any accurate predictions about how Tebow will perform under game conditions at the next level. Give the boy a chance to compete. He is my racehorse if he never wins another race.
Tebow, Meyer, Florida
Heya… stumbled this way from another football site on SB Nation…
The way I think about it, is that Florida’s spread option offense under Tebow and Meyer is how an offense would look like if it used the Wildcat full time. Tebow was a threat to run inside, option, or pass, with each snap. Tebow was also the team’s best short yardage back! Tebow and his style of play were an excellent fit for Meyer’s offense.
I am sure that Tebow knew this in his consideration to play for Florida and Meyer. Tebow’s a stand-up guy, and I would be willing to bet that his choice also involved education, culture and other opportunities that a University of Florida degree would make available for him.
I suppose if an NFL team liked what they saw from the Gators, they could try to hire Meyer or one of his assistants to teach the spread option offense. But yeah, Tebow is a spread option qb, and currently there is not an offense in the NFL that runs the offense the way the Gators ran it.
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