Denver Broncos quarterback Tim Tebow is the new Brett Favre of the NFL.
Favre was either loved or hated, much like Tebow is now. And No. 4 was also unconventional, choosing to throw into triple coverage over the easy target, making the big plays and big mistakes.
Favre used to be the go-to name in pro-sports, there was even an entire summer ESPN camped out in Hattiesburg, Miss., but now its Tebow's turn.
It's hard to explain the Tim Tebow phenomenon, but a scene from the television show "Friday Night Lights" comes to mind.
In the pilot episode Taylor Kitsch's character toasts his best friend by saying, "Here's to God. And Football. And in 10 years good friends living large in Texas." Replace Florida, and equally football crazed state, with Texas and that's a taste of the mindset that elevated Tebow from high school star to college star.
Add the fact that Tebow makes many of us believe in the age old sports cliches like "staying positive" and "never giving up" can lead to victories, with good looks and his overt religious belief, and there's the formula for the most popular athlete in sports.
It should be no surprise that when Tebow does something the experts say cannot happen, like beat the vaunted Pittsburgh Steelers defense with one throw in overtime, the Internet explodes.
Helping his legend status, the fact that in the Steelers game Tebow passed for 316 yards, averaging 31.6 yards per pass. That lead to an explosion of people looking up "John 3:16" on Google, because it's one of Tebow's favorite Bible verses and he wore it on his eye black in the '09 BCS Championship game.
Tebow got too much credit for the playoff win, like all football quarterbacks. To borrow from Mark Kiszla, unless MVP means most visible player, Tebow wasn't all that for Denver.
Running back Willis McGahee meant way more to Denver's rise to the playoffs.
Tebow is still very young, with less than 20 NFL starts. There's room to improve and to continue to silence the critics.
Just know we'll hear, tweet and Facebook about every step of that journey, just like Brett Favre.
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| Tim Tebow is fairly popular. Especially when his passing yards = Bible verses. |
2 comments:
Good post and comparison to Favre. I also think it took media spotlight away from the Penn State scandal.
Tebow's charisma is what elicits all the extreme responses from the pundits and regular Americans. Also, the fact that his own GM (Elway) was not 100% behind him, and that he really could not throw the ball, but he still won 7 or 8 straight games, was fairly incredible. It's as unlikely story as there is.
Hadn't thought about the comparison to Favre. Great point. I am warming up to him a bit, but talent wise I still think he's mostly a system guy that does all that he's asked to do - which most of the time isn't very much. You can't dislike his approach to the game, either. I'd much rather have a Tebow-like, humble and hard working superstar than a self-promoting, underachieving troublemaker. He's a breath of fresh air.
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