As much as I hate to do it, I have to agree with cval here, Tim just isn't ready (passing wise) to be a full time starter in the league, sub 50% completions don't cut it. He is still listed as a QB and we, as his fans, need to embrace the idea that he is doing everything he can to help the Jets win games. Go Jets!
I'm saying if I was Tebow, that's what I'd be concerned with. It doesn't affect me either way, but that's what I'd advise him if I was his manager.
It may or may not have been an option, but I'm inclined to agree with you that Elway wanted him out. Regardless, I'm speaking hypothetically it would have been better to learn under Manning. I don't think the pre-season hurt him that much, because he was playing QB for many periods. People had the same questions of him after the pre-season. The difference here is that he might get seen more as a gadget QB/TE/FB.
It is not unwise to use vocabulary as it is meant to be used. If people misunderstand, I can't help them other than to point them to the dictionary. I don't think he gets to decide things on his own, otherwise he would have "chosen" to be a starting QB on a Superbowl contender with Urban Meyer as his coach. But to suggest that he had no say is hyperbole. He had some say as to whether he went to Jax or NY, didn't he? I will agree that him being ousted from Denver was probably 90% Elway. If Manning didn't get signed, Tebow would have been happy to stay there, I'm sure.
I agree with you on these points. Though, I wouldn't call the fans "rabid". They are fans just like any other, "fanatics" if you will.
I don't think we misunderstood. I'm a little turned off by the "brand" point, even correctly understood. I just meant that it is what it is, and there's no sense rehashing it. I was saying that to go on and say his "brand," if he has one, is "great attitude, team player, goody two shoes." This is consistent with that. It can be a big part of a legend one day. The Jets are so much better than that dumpster fire they call a team in Jacksonville. This is much better. There's nothing detrimental about the way he's being used to his actual development. He's getting on the field, and when he receives the snap it is the seeds of an offense tailored to his skills. If Sanchez went down, Tebow would take over and there would be even more plays build around those formations and possibilities. I think if you'll be honest with yourself, the thing you didn't like was that he didn't bust it for many yards. It's hard to watch when he gets stopped, because we know he will get so few chances and be judged so critically. But they were vanilla plays and all but one busted through the line of scrimmage for positive yardage. There will be some teams who don't defend it well. And there will be some teams who defend it well, but they get popped with a throw or something else deceptive.
Tebow should play where he can get on the field and make the biggest impact. Both parts of that equation are important but in terms of the Tebow brand being on the field is more important than being off of it. I actually think he has more value as a wildcat/option QB if he is on the field more often in other capacities, since the defense would have to account for the possibility of a Tebow play more often and without being able to switch personnel to counter it. Tebow as an H-back just makes so much sense given his skills and the way the Jets want to use him. Sanchez does take a defender out wide with him every time he splits out and while it is not an ideal formation for the wildcat it's probably just fine for QB draws out of the shotgun and option runs to the strong side.
I don't know why you keep referencing my use of the term "brand". There is nothing to be "turned off" by. Tebow's brand, according to him, is that he is an NFL QB. I'd actually like to discuss it more. What exactly turns you off by the word "brand"? I am honest with myself. You are presumptuous to insinuate that you know the inner workings of my mind. I have zero issue with him not busting for many yards, though I would have preferred if he had. My issue, as I've stated repeatedly is the use of him on special teams, as a WR, and in run-only QB plays so far. He was asked to do nothing that a QB1, or QB2 for that matter, in the NFL is typically asked to do. I think that if the perception becomes that this is how he is most valuable to a team, he will not be able to shake it.
It conveys and entirely selfish and marketing-oriented view of how to go about a career -- "brand." Brand is about perception and reputation. The idea of Tebow protecting his "brand" is disgusting. He's a football player, and he has remained a quarterback. The notion that he can't do these other things because he will gradually dilute or change his "brand" would be selfish. I'm not worried about Tebow thinking that way. It just makes you look like you don't care about the team winning at all, like you've got this Public Relations vision of Tebow that must be preserved at all costs. Tebow doesn't get to decide whether he makes it in this league. He'd better concentrate on making himself invaluable to an NFL team, using all the talents he has. The name of the game is to stay in the game -- stay relevant, keep getting put in the game. Preserving a "brand" is not part of it. I can understand not making a position switch -- that's his right, and no one can expect him to give up being a quarterback if he doesn't want to. But the way you put it, it was just the additional stuff on special teams -- when being PP is solely so that he can run direct snap fakes. It's been done before.
The point is that I don't believe what he is doing on special teams is going to help the team win. If I was Tebow I'd be careful about the long-term implications of this, considering he wants to be a QB1.
I would have called it insightful and forward-looking, but hey, to each their own. No disrespect to you or Dierking, but I can't really take you guys seriously based on your attitudes on the forum.
1.) One man concerning himself with another man's "brand" and "prestige" is certainly creepy. 2.) Suggesting it would be better for his career to reject doing what his coaches ask of him and rotting on the bench to protect his "brand" is at a whole new level of stupid. You really can't make this shit up. HAHA- What are you going to come up with next?
I take issue with this though. Many college QB's have switched positions to play in the NFL because they were missing some key element of what it takes to be an NFL QB. Some of those players have become stars in their own right once they made the switch. Prominent players in this generation who played QB in college include Hines Ward, Antwan Randall-El and Josh Cribbs. The all-time leading KR in the NFL is Brian Mitchell. Freddie Solomon caught 371 passes in the NFL after switching from QB. The reason these guys switched positions was not because they'd be better in their new position. It was because they didn't have the necessary skills to play QB consistently in the NFL. We think of the NFL and in particular the first few seasons of a QB's career as a learning experience. What they're learning though is not how to play the position in most cases. What they're learning is the difference in speed and size of the opposition as they transition from college ball to the NFL. They're learning the scheme that they now have to fit into in the NFL, which is often different from the college offense they operated in. Along the way often a bad habit here or there, sometimes one that was overlooked in the screening process before the draft, is diligently coached and worked away by the QB and the coaches. This is polishing of the final product to make the player a superior NFL QB. The problem Tim Tebow presents is that he does not have the basic skills down to play QB in the NFL. I'm not going to tear him down here piece-by-piece but he's almost entirely lacking in the basic skills needed to play QB in the NFL. In the normal course of events he would have been told prior to the draft that he was not playing QB in the NFL and would likely be taken as an H-back or maybe a TE or maybe even a RB. There would not have been the option for him to push back as a QB because the more he did that the lower his draft stock would have fallen until he reached 7th round status or maybe even UDFA trying desperately to get his foot in the door. The fact that he was a record-setting college QB wouldn't have mattered given the skills that he possessed, which were not applicable to playing QB in the NFL. Instead because he was marketable teams tiptoed around the QB issue and Tebow and his representatives made certain that everybody knew he was working on his passing motion to remove the hitch and hold the ball higher and all of that. They did promo videos of him at training sessions, raising his release point and working on his release time and all of that. They were focused on getting him drafted by an NFL team as a QB and hopefully in the first couple of rounds. That was their plan. Get him into the NFL as a QB and everything else would fall into place. The problem that still remains however 2+ years after they succeeded at their plan is that Tebow still doesn't look like an NFL QB. He's made marginal improvements over the intervening period but he still reverts to the same patterns under pressure. He still holds the ball too low and winds up when he throws it, giving him a slow release time and making his throws wildly inaccurate at times. He still hasn't mastered the ability of progressing through his reads and anticipating where the open man will be. He guns the ball to his receivers because he's a split second late releasing the ball and he's not throwing to the spot they're going to be at, he's throwing to where they are. In other words Tebow is still caught in the trap of reading a key defender and making decisions off of that read. The problem is the NFL doesn't have a key defender to read on any given play. It has multiple defenders that you have to account for and you have to have them all in mind while other guys are chasing you down. The greater over-arching problem is that Tebow needs to learn to play QB from the fundamentals up and he needs to do this at the NFL level. Either that or he needs to convince a team to run the read-option and acquire the necessary players to make that work. With that monumental undertaking accomplished he then has to hope that the speed of the NFL game doesn't disarm him. It's really a conundrum. The simplest solution for all involved is going to be to find the position that Tim Tebow can be great at or at least make an impact at and move him there. The odds on him becoming a good NFL QB are just vanishingly small unless the definition of what a good NFL QB is changes dramatically over the next few years. The clock is ticking on his career at this point and it ticks really fast in the NFL.
But that was their decision. And presumably they were offered a gig. They have to decide whether (1) they want to; and (2) they think they can be successful at it. There is no guarantee that Tebow will be successful at another position -- that's why only he can make that decision what he wants to do. All those people saying "switch! switch!" will be nowhere to be found if it turns out he's just ho-hum as an H back. Disagree, but obviously no point in hashing it out. Obviously, if Tebow thought this, he would try a switch. Well, the "normal course of events" that occurred on the planet we actually occupy is that he was drafted in the first round as a QB, and if he hadn't gone there, he would have definitely gone within about 15 picks of that spot. It is a virtual certainty he would have gone ahead of McCoy and Clausen no matter how many times you replay that draft. He has an NFL arm, those two do not. That's a cherished myth. Nobody wants a "marketing" success at quarterback. You cannot hide at that position in the NFL. They believe he could do it because he has a great arm, great size and athleticism, and displayed an uncanny ability to be accurate at long distances. Most QB's who don't have it fail at the long throws. Tebow presented a "fixable" project. He is noticeably better. He's good enough to consider the ongoing development a success. The reason it doesn't look pretty is that (1) it will never look pretty with Tebow; and (2) he still needs more work on his rhythm and drops. It's his body and feet that are still late. It takes time and reps -- and he's never had even the reps that Brandon Weedon has. He's never had a single training camp or OTA where he was "the guy," the one they're' working with and letting him have a lot of reps with feedback. He's always been the second stringer at camp and OTA's. Now, that's okay -- that's life. But when trying to gauge the speed of his progress, it's a factor to be taken into consideration. If he had looked good to you in preseason, it would have probably seemed to be right on time. Well, sometimes the outings in preseason can be a little deceptive -- they were for Sanchez this year. And they were for Tebow (albeit in a different way), I'll wager. He's got throws he didn't have before.
Actually, the guys who switched from QB were generally offered take-it-or-leave-it type propositions. The Jets were one of the few franchises who kind of weebled a bit, telling Brad Smith that he could compete at QB but they expected to convert him to WR after they got him into camp. I can't think of anybody who fought his way onto an NFL roster, with people trying to switch him and came out as a QB. That doesn't mean the person doesn't exist but I can't think of him. Kordell Stewart was drafted as a QB and then used as a slash player because he had real skills as a WR. The Steelers let Neil O'Donnell go at least partly because they knew they had Stewart in house to take over the job.
And Tebow hasn't even had anybody ask him to switch. He's expected to just dream it up on his own. He keeps having these pesky NFL teams wanting to sign him as a quarterback. Shefter reported 6 teams interested in acquiring him when the Broncos put him up for fire sale earlier this year (traded was completed within about a day of announced intent). Presumably none of them wanted to start a new position with him -- they wanted him as a backup QB who could also help them in other ways, with a good chance of developing him into a starting QB. The Packers wanted him -- Flynn had just been set free to cash in. I think the Packers believe in their ability to develop quarterbacks.
