Dawg Bites: Should the Cleveland Browns Have Gone After QB Tim Tebow?
We’re debuting a new feature here at Dawg Pound Daily, called Dawg Bites. Every week, the DPD staff will get together and debate a topic in the football world, offering some unique commentary.
Today, we discuss the man who has seemingly become the most talked-about player in NFL history – Tim Tebow. While he was traded to the New York Jets earlier this week, some of us wonder whether the Cleveland Browns should have made a run at Tebow. Others aren’t so sure.
Jimmy Weinland:
I’d take Tim Tebow every day of the week and twice on Sunday. This isn’t really about whether he would be a better quarterback in Cleveland than Colt McCoy, or if he would be a distraction; this is about the Browns’ fight to stay relevant. They very clearly are waiting for the right moment to launch their window of opportunity. Last season was a year building up to that, and now that they’ve missed out on Andrew Luck and Robert Griffin III, they’ll spend another season positioning themselves for the future to begin. Tim Tebow is not the future at quarterback for this franchise, he’s a gimmick to get it through another year. At this rate the Browns are going to need help selling tickets and they aren’t nabbing any nationally televised games either.
Trading for his Lordship would have only cost the team a fourth- or fifth-round pick, and as a backup to McCoy, he provides far more intrigue and upside than Seneca Wallace does as the Browns’ quest for a long-term answer continues. To that, Colt McCoy has been injurred in each of the last three seasons (two pro, one college) and in the AFC North I’m not betting on his health. Wouldn’t it be more interesting to spend the week talking about Tim Tebow getting a start as opposed to Seneca Wallace?
Kevin Nye:
Now that Tebow has gone to the New York Jets, it’s time to breathe a sigh of relief. Had the Browns gone after Tim Tebow, I may have renounced my fandom. Not only is he a mediocre quarterback (at best), he is also the clear-cut worst quarterback who was “available” for the Browns to go after. Not that I think the Browns should have gone after any of them in the first place (although you’re an idiot if you don’t at least call the best quarterback of all time when he’s a free agent).
While I understand the sentiment of simply creating relevancy again, I feel pretty strongly that Browns fans are the ultimate when it comes to destroying a player’s mentality despite being a “fan” of the very player himself. Tebow would go through so much trauma from week to week that he wouldn’t even really care about football anymore. Can you imagine the local mobs after a three-game losing streak?
I will concede that it would be a much more entertaining situation to have ol’ Tim Tebow under center, er, in the shotgun in the likely event that McCoy goes down for a few games this coming season. But that doesn’t mean it would have been smart to go after him as a quarterback option in Cleveland.
But as a giant white running back…
Think the Jets will take a fifth-rounder for him?