Some development since
last week. No need to wait for Monday night's game, as neither Luck nor Rivers is going anywhere. Let's take a look at potential opportunities for Tebow:
On the List
- Jaguars Hooray! Jacksonville did not get slaughtered by Denver as badly as expected. Shad Khan is dead wrong when he says the team needs "a lot of good players". They have talent, especially on defense. Paul Posluszny is awesome, and Gus Bradley knows how to coach a defense. Sadly, their defense is held back by an execrable offense. Subtract the defense's pick six and the Jaguar offense scored only 12 points against the worst passing defense in the NFL. The thing is, they have offensive talent too, Justin Blackmon is a beast of a receiver and Maurice Jones-Drew could be productive again in a decent team. What they lack is leadership, the will to win, and a mobile QB who can make things happen. The Jaguars are not a playoff team, but with Tim Tebow they could have had a legitimate shot at going 8-8 this season. Against all odds I hope Caldwell will shelve his pride and take a shot. Absent that, they will probably go 0-16, and the Tebow haters who have taken over their die hard fan websites deserve the team they have.
- Browns I spoke too soon last week. Brandon Weeden is struggling and the team is clearly not committed to him as a long term solution. Their actions over the next week or two will tell us whether they intend to write off the season and use Weeden as a caretaker, or if they want to reward the perpetually hopeless Browns fans by making a serious effort to salvage a winning season. Now that they have Willis Mcgahee as running back, they could bring in Tim and try and recreate the chemistry of the Denver runnning game. Or they could trade for Mallett, opening up a backup spot for Tim in NE.
Off the List
- Bills Thad Lewis played decent and the Bills gave the tough Bengal defense a run for their money on Sunday. They brought Matt Flynn in for a workout today. It is clear they are not interested in anyone who could challenge EJ Manuel, and they are looking to make do until he recovers.
Watch
- Texans If Schaub's injury keeps him out for a while, they will go to backup TJ Yates. I still don't see them giving up on Schaub as their franchise QB, but the fan base is not happy.
- Raiders Pryor got hammered with 10 sacks yesterday. Not his fault, but it does show the problem with a mobile QB with passing weaknesses. If you contain him and press him, things can get ugly. For now, they chalk this up to development and stick with Pryor.
- Bucs Tampa lost again and is still winless, but Mike Glennon played reasonably well. Greg Schiano is in a lot of trouble, especially with the NFLPA after him. I agree with Kathryn Sorensen's comment on last week's update though: if Schiano is fired, an interim coach is unlikely to make a risky move like bringing in Tebow.
- Patriots If you missed Tom Brady's 73 second comeback last night, you should curse your luck. It was a joy to behold, and an exhibition of consummate professionalism on the part of the entire team. No movement on a Mallett trade yet, but with the NFL trade dealine only two weeks away, some team might make an offer rather than risk having the window closed until next year. As I have said before, Tebow would be the obvious choice as backup since he knows the system, and he might bring some new options to the Pats' red zone struggles.
- Injury Monster The Beast almost got Matt Schaub this week. The replay looked ugly, as did the crowd reaction. There is no official injury status yet, but reporters saw Schaub walking around in the locker room, so presumably his ankle injury is not too serious. Thad Lewis sprained his ankle too, but it sounds like a "tape it up and take motrin" injury.
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ReplyDeleteWell, so much for my idea that Tebow was deflating. He's still huge:
ReplyDeletehttps://twitter.com/Tebowtime316/status/389807515002613760
I thought he was doing yoga for flexibility/elasticity? So does Ray Lewis and others do yoga for that reason. I'm not sure the muscle bound thing is valid.
DeleteKeep in mind he's never going to be exceptionally lithe; and that he needs a certain amount of bulk for durability as a power runner. If I had to guess he's somewhere in his 230's - a good 15 to 20 lbs lower than last season. Look at it this way: if House isn't asking him to slim down even further then things are probably going reasonably well.
ReplyDeleteAs far as the nuclear option is concerned, I remain optimistic that an opportunity will present itself, but the insistence of these organizations to repeatedly bypass him as they recycle through an assortment of the same castaways makes me wonder if that opportunity isn't further down the road. As in next season. The post nuclear option, so to speak.
"Look at it this way: if House isn't asking him to slim down even further then things are probably going reasonably well."
DeleteThat's true. But Tim's capable, at times, of being very stubborn. I can't imagine Tim still refusing to give up the upper-body weights at such a gloomy time in his career, though. He's stubborn sometimes, but not to the point of being self-destructive.
And, yes, it's increasingly looking like next season is more likely. Maybe Mallet won't get traded by the deadline this year, so he'll get dealt in the offseason, as originally expected. I'm still holding out NE as the ideal situation. -Brooke
There is a great story about Tim at Florida, where the coaches had to confiscate his protein shakes because he was outlifting the linemen.
DeleteI don't remember having heard that one before, but that sounds like Tim. He also was doing push-ups in the aisle of the plane he was on when he flew to Denver for the first time after he was drafted. Tim prides himself on being the toughest guy on the field & in the weight room. To give up even just upper-body weights will be giving up a big part of his identity. He's also notorious for hiding, & even lying about, injuries. So I hope he's not being foolish here & claiming to be cutting back on the upper body work, but then lifting weights or doing 1000 push-ups or whatever on his own time. I wouldn't put it past him. As Dan Mullen said, Tim can be stubborn.-Brooke
DeleteEd, I've been reading that RG3 has been playing badly this year & that he & Shanny aren't even getting along, b/c RG3 doesn't want to run Option plays for fear of injury. Do you think the Skins should be added to the list of possible teams?-Brooke
ReplyDeleteNo I don't. Given the amount of draft picks they invested in him and the acclaim he received last year, it would take several years of very bad play for them to consider giving up on him. Also, backup Kirk Cousins played well last year and would undoubtedly be their first resort should RGIII go down for some reason.
DeleteI forgot about Cousins-he's good. Thanks for answering. -Brooke
DeleteThe interwebz blew up with another Tebow to Cleveland rumor today, but this one seemed bogus from the start. With no one in the press able to confirm or even source that he was in town (or not), the dude at USC that tweeted a sighting of his own this afternoon seems way more plausible. I suspect TT's going to make a lot of phantom trips to struggling NFL towns over the coming weeks haha. If his people were smart they'd start a line of "I just saw Tebow at _____________!" tee shirts.
ReplyDeleteThat one was especially silly. Tim is not going to come to town via the Cleveland airport. Guys rich enough to own football teams are rich enough to own private jets, which they park in private hangars at executive airports, where passengers can disembark in privacy. But still, the fact that rumors are so hot in Cleveland speaks to the rather obvious need there.
DeleteNow if someone wants to find out the tail number of Jimmy Haslam's private jet and then show an FAA flight plan to and from LA today, then I'll be impressed. :)
Delete>>But still, the fact that rumors are so hot in Cleveland speaks to the rather obvious need there.<<
ReplyDeleteIndeed. Normally the self-anointed football savants spring up in droves to laugh down the idea of giving TT a shot, but those were few and far between today. If twitter is any indication, it seems as though the Cleveland fanbase is for the most part at least open to the idea. Unfortunately the front office indicated its willingness to tank the season when they cut Richardson. Hoyer shifted that paradigm a bit, but with Weeden back in the driver's seat and steering them toward oblivion they may be content to go ahead and race Jax to the bottom. The winner gets a guy that pads his stats every week playing against Rutgers and Temple. Fantastic.
>>Now if someone wants to find out the tail number of Jimmy Haslam's private jet and then show an FAA flight plan to and from LA today...<<
I've discovered in this whole affair that I have a disturbing talent for paparazzi-esque stalking, but I'm not *that* bad.