Having said that the contrarian and Gator hater in me doesn't want to let this thing go. So here is my final knock on Tebow's season.
Tebow supporters will argue that Florida's 3 losses should not be held against him. He played well in all three games and the defense let them down. The Heisman is an individual award and no individual had a better season than Tim Tebow. Fair enough.
If you are adamant that his teammates' poor performance shouldn't hurt his case, don't turn around and use it to bolster his argument in the next breath. Let me explain.
The first bullet in the "Tebow For Heisman" presentation is always "51 touchdowns". Impressive indeed. Tebow rushed for 22 touchdowns, in large part because the Gators lack a good between-the-tackles running back. Percy Harvin, their best rushing threat, is built more like a marathoner than a short yardage bruiser. If the Gators had such a back and Tebow rushed for 8 or 10 touchdowns instead of 22, he wouldn't even be invited to the Downtown Athletic Club.
I cannot grant Florida fans point A unless they cede point B.
11 comments:
doesn't your point further validate the fact that tebow essentially excelled at two different positions for the gators? i understand your point that if the gators had a go to running back, tim wouldn't have as many td runs... fair enough, doesn't change the fact that what he has done has never been accomplished before.
I would not say that Tim Tebow excelled at running back. He ended up averaging just 4.3 yards per carry which is probably about average for a college running back. Granted, many of his carries were in short yard situations so that brought his average down, but his long run of the season was 25 yards. That is certainly not good enough statistics for a Heisman type running back. I think it is more accurate to say that Tebow was a very good quarterback and a slightly above average running back. I do believe, however, that this makes Tebow worthy of the Heisman trophy.
What I'm saying is that either both team-oriented arguments are valid or neither are.
Ostertag, his rushing avg is hurt by two factors. You already addressed the first in that he rushes in a lot of short yardage situations. The second is that sacks are factored into his rushing avg as well. Take the sacks away and you are prob looking at an average of over 5, which is impressive.
Tremont, Tebow rushed the ball in a lot of short yardage situations while the Gators had a running back on their roster who has good size (especially for college) and has started several games for the Packers this season. Thus, it would reason that if the Gators had a more legit goal line/short yardage back, Tebow would still get a lot of rushing TD's.
Furthermore, if the Gators had a legitimate goal line back, Tebow might actually throw for more TD's since he would be able to utilize the always effective play-action pass near the endzone. So if he had something like 12 rushing td's and 35 passing td's he'd still be in contention for Heisman and arguably would still be the favorite based on this year's contenders.
Lastly, and this isn't directed to you Tremont, if Tebow was a Senior, would there be any question as to who should win the Heisman? It would be Tebow in a landslide. The whole underclassman/pay your dues argument is just silly.
not to mention this is all conjecture... you can argue all you want about IF they had a go to running back, IF dixon did not get injured, and so on. in reality tebow had an unparalleled season as a qb in ncaa history
Two points. First, I recognize that Tebow's yards per carry is hurt by sacks. For quarterbacks however, those losses are usually offset by increased yards on runs where the QB is scrambling on a broken pass play. That's why running QB's usually have a higher rushing average than running backs.
Secondly, I really don't think it is accurate to say that Tebow has had an unparalleled season for an NCAA QB. The stat that everyone marvels at is the 50+ total touchdowns. That is an amazing number, but certainly it is not unparalleled. Without looking at past statistics, I am sure several quarterbacks have had more combined touchdowns than Tebow this year. Just off the top of my head I know Colt Brennan had 58 touchdown passes last year.
While Tebow had the best season of any NCAA QB this year, let's not annoint this season as the best year in QB history.
the unparalleled part i was referring to was the 20/20... i realize the timmy changs and colt brennans have produced more td's in a season.
sorry i forgot to include my name... i had a wet lunch today
Of course it's conjecture. Every such argument is. You think Colt Brennan wouldn't rack up those kinds of numbers in the SEC? I agree, but it's conjecture nonetheless. You think I couldn't pull off a threesome with Jessica Alba and Laura Bush? Probably not, but it's purely conjecture since I have never tried.
Again I think he should win the Heisman, but I just wanted to point out dents in the argument.
i agree with your points and enjoy your articles mr. tremont. my final point would be that people have had seasons like colt brennan, people have had seasons like darren mcfadden, yet no one has done what tim has done (regardless of the circumstances surrounding it). another point no one has brought up is that pat white and dennis dixon who both play in spread offenses were unable to make it through the season without misssing significant playing time, however, tebow, in the most difficult conference (subjective i know) played through a bum shoulder and a broken hand through one half game and put up ridiculous numbers. that in itself i believe says a lot and i realize i said final point and that is probably at least two points but i hope you can appreciate them
That is a wildly enticing threesome. I have spent the last twenty minutes thinking of what my gameplan would be for that threesome. It comes down to whether I want to run from the "I" formation or the modern spread.
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