Did Florida do Tebow a disservice?

The college coach is judged on how many games he wins or loses. Less than 5% of DI college kids on scholarship will ever play a down in the NFL. If a kid wants to play for an NFL prep-school there are plenty of them out there that run an NFL type offense.
Paul Johnson and those not running NFL offenses are not evil, they are good college coaches doing what college coaches are paid to do, win college football games and providing a great college football experience for college students, putting fans in the seats and winning ball games. JMO

Tebow has a Heisman Torphy, Two National Championships, and is one of the greatest to ever play college football. He will have a shot to prove himself in the NFL. I would say Florida did pretty well for him.

The media plays a huge role in a players draft stock in my opinion and they are very hypocritical of themselves. Lets start with Colt Brennan from a couple years ago. Had outstanding numbers, very accurate, etc. But the knock on him was the level of competition. Dan Lefevour from Central Michigan played less competition than Brennan did, did not have the same numbers, he is a Tebow type player in the MAC yet is projected higher than Tebow in the Draft? Doesn't make sense. Take Snead from the SEC, same competition as Tebow but does not have the numbers like Tebow, yet rated higher than Tebow? Doesn't make sense. Yea Tebow had a great surrounding cast but he still put up amazing numbers this year with less to work with than the previous two years. He had roughly 4 Ints this year. Snead had about 18. Then there is Sam Bradford who excelled the previous year with one of the best O-Lines ever. I do not see how he is the #1 Qb in the draft. He is going to be a huge bust.

I guess what I am getting at is that the media picks and chooses who they want to blow up and it has a huge impact on swaying opinions.

And a free education

Who was it held the gun to his head made Tebow choose Florida during the recruiting process?

Completely agree Dave. Not much I can add to that, other than to say that if a player has proven himself in the college ranks, he will get a shot in the NFL. Regardless of where he gets drafted, Tebow will get a shot, and in my opinion, that's all you can ask for.

I know there is more than numbers to determine NFL potential but what else could Tebow have done? A heisman winner, 2 national championships, threw for over 9,000 yards, 88 TD passes to only 16 INT's which is amazing, almost 3,000 yards rushing and 57 rushing tds. And this is against SEC talent. What's this kid gotta do? He honestly could not have done much else. We all know he needs to work a little on mechanics but what would better mechanics have done for him? maybe throw 2 INT's a year instead of 5?

Meyer should be declared the best coach of all time then since he got those numbers and championships out of the SEC out of a kid thats not NFL quality.

So what should happen if GT wins a national championship with all of those non-NFL talent kids?

What Tebow could have done to be a better NFL prospect and help his chances was to give up on QB his freshman year of high school and become the best TE or LB he could be. I personally like Tim Tebow and hope he will become a good QB because I like who he is as a person. Urban Meyer got a kid who could run HIS system and Tebow fit like a glove. This doesn't make Urban Meyer a great coach (although other things do) or Tebow a great NFL prospect. All it means is that Tebow fit the system. How he turns out as an NFL player will have no impact on how he played his 4 years of college football. Your argument is similar to Scott Frost from Nebraska. He was a champion QB in college and put up great numbers but had to be moved to Safety because he wasn't an NFL style QB. All these kids can do is to pick a college, and then run the system that they are told to run.

Bottom line, the 'scouting service media' tends to forget about the intangibles involved in an athlete; intelligence, leadership qualities, work ethic, etc... They don't focus on the facts that with a little bit of coaching, Tebow and many other athletes (TOM BRADY) have the potential to not only play at the next level and actually do some fantastic things. All they look at is :

A) What is showing up on film; something that they don't have a clue how to decipher.
B) They're 'knowledge' of the game, which is ridiculously overrated.
C) Echoing with other sports writers have stated; they're like a bunch of parrots.

Even when they get the tangible aspects from the combine, they still won't have a clue how a player will develop.. I mean, we're talking about kids that just hit their 20s; they've got a few more years to develop.

And, as far as Florida 'hindering' Tebow; that's bullsh-t. He set numerous college records, won NTs, along with a Heisman. So what if he throws the ball side-arm; that's something a QB coach can fix between now and the fall.

Bottom line; sports writers are there to write about 'controversies' and to appeal to the 'Football For Dummies' crowd. I worked with a guy who, because of his subscriptions to SI and ESPN Mag. and the fact that his brother-in-law played D1AA ball,was sure that he was an expert on football. I hated working with him.. I would hear all kinds of moronic crap; "The Tampa C2 is a crap defense, "The spread is the only effective offense in football," "The option is a dad offense..." Frickin' idiot; it got to the point where you couldn't even argue with him; no matter what you say or did, he knew the sport's writers were right and everyone else was wrong.

I agree with so many of you, that Tebow prospered in Florida's system and in no way should they be accused of hindering his development. But we had an interesting scenario a few years back at the high school where I coach that relates a bit. Our tailback (Pro-I offense) was a big banger -- 6'1, 215 -- and we had a lot of success running him between the tackles. He racked up over 2,500 yards for his career, made all-league twice and helped us win a lot of games. But because we gave him the ball 25-30 times a game and he took a real pounding, we only played him one way. When colleges came in to recruit him, they all felt he was too slow to be a college TB and they wanted him to play linebacker instead. But because there wasn't any film of him at LB, some schools shied away. Long story short, he wound up getting a partial scholarship to a I-AA school, but the father was critical of us and believed that if we'd played him at LB he would have gotten a full D-1 ride. I still maintain that we did the right thing, but I admit that I've thought more than once about whether we should have featured him more at the position he was likely to play in college.

I agree with the contradictions the media makes. The same year Colt Brennan was in the draft everyone made a stink about the level of competition that he played. Well the Ravens QB (Flacco) came out in the same year or the year after and everyone was all over him. My gosh the guy played at Delaware. Now he plays in a run domintated offense. Yet he is still considered a top QB in the NFL. The draft and scouting is a joke. Mel Kiper was talking about how Dwyer from Georgia Tech is a risk because of the "System" he played in. However, they then worrying about a RB carrying the ball 30 times a game. Tebow will be fine depending on where he goes. If you put him with a team that runs the ball constantly he will be fine. You throw an entire West Coast Offense at him and make him make all these decisions as a rookie you are setting yourself up for failure. Sanchez benefitted this year because the Jets could run the football.

Sorry if this got too fan oriented, but to me NFL football is going down the toilet.

You cant even compare Scott Frost to Tim Tebow. Frost threw for roughly 1,000 yards his senior year where Tebow was 3 times that.

I heard this and I just friggin laughed... Had Dwyer been in a 'Pro Style attack', he would have still been a good RB. He's big (6'0, 228), he's fast, and moreover, he's a hard running, gutsy ball carrier. Again, they don't take the intangibles into consideration; the guy runs HARD, period.

Look at the other Adrian Peterson; a Georgia Southern fullback under PJ back in the late 90s. He is now playing for the Bears. He hasn't had a 'storied' career, but he has the ability to play in the NFL.