Jaguars Journal
by Sam Kouvaris
March 20, 2010
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Is Tim coming here?
"If the Jaguars don't take him at 10, he'll be gone by 15," Bob Tebow, Tim's dad told me at the end of the former Gator quarterback's workout in Gainesville. "They don't have a second round pick and if they think he'll be around later, he won't." While I understand being a proud dad, I was struck by the conviction Bob had when talking numbers in the draft. It didn't sound like wishful thinking.
"What if the Jaguars trade down?" I asked. "He'll be gone," Bob said quickly. "Somebody's 'going to take him." With that we smiled and shook hands and he was swept away in the wake of people that follows his son these days.
So why does he think that? It can't all be bravado and wishful thinking as a father. Somebody, Tim's agent, the NFL, has convinced Bob Tebow that his son will be picked in the upper half of the first round of the NFL draft in April. The league seemed to follow suit, inviting Tim to New York for the draft. They've doubled the number of invitees from 10 to 20 but still, if they didn't think he'd be picked in the first round would they really ask him to be there?
Would he go?
The Jaguars were represented at Pro Day by a good contingent; minus head coach Jack Del Rio. General Manger Gene Smith was there along with Coordinators Mel Tucker and Dirk Koetter. Receivers coach Todd Monken was in attendance with O-Line coach Andy Heck.
"I think he showed how he was willing to change," Smith said after Tim's workout. "He definitely changed and shortened his motion, he was very accurate and his footwork was improved." Smith is on the record as liking everything about Tim Tebow. "He makes me wish my daughters were a little older," he quipped at one Jaguars get together. "He's going to be successful in the NFL, he's going to make one team very happy when they draft him."
So is that team the Jaguars?
In the first round?
Smith didn't comment on that, and has never betrayed his neutral stance on Tim and the Jaguars first pick. Honestly, 10 seems a little high to take Tebow unless you think he's a starter at some point in your first year. You're not going to win the Super Bowl with a rookie as your quarterback, nobody has, so taking him in the first round would be a pick for somewhere down the road. Late first round, possibly.
The 10th pick this year doesn't seem any different than the twentieth pick this year except you'll pay him an extra $10 million dollars.
"Nineteen million," was my answer to Bob Tebow when we talked about the bonus money with the tenth pick and why I thought it might be hard for the Jaguars to spend that on anybody.
"They'll make that up in two years in ticket sales if they take Tim," the elder Tebow said in a quick retort.
I don't doubt that but you don't take Tim to sell tickets. You take him if you think he's a starter in the NFL and you think he can take you to the Super Bowl. I think he's both of those and would like to see the Jaguars get him in this draft. I just think they're in a quandary, weighing the "local hero" aspect against the strict football player mentality.
One draft "analyst" (actually junior analyst) thinks Jacksonville would be the worst place he could go. Too much pressure, too many expectations.
I couldn't disagree more.
Tim knows how to handle pressure and as far as the heat the team might take to put him in the lineup, the football fan here is sophisticated enough to know that he's not ready to be a starter. If David Garrard falters, sure, they'll be calling for Tim to be in the lineup. Any maybe that's the right move. But I have confidence in the Jaguars brass, especially Gene Smith and Wayne Weaver to make the right call when it's the right time for any rookie quarterback to get in the lineup.
If you draft Tim, you're signaling then beginning of the end of Garrard's tenure as the starting quarterback. Maybe not this year, but eventually that's going to happen.
There are still plenty of needs on this team but is a 10th overall pick going to be enough of an impact player to really change things for 2010? Outside of the top 5 picks I don't think you can say that about any of the players available. So if you can't trade down, why not use the pick on a guy you know will compete as hard as possible and make everybody around him better?
Matt Jones and Reggie Williams are pretty good examples of where the Jaguars missed in the first round. Akili Smith, Heath Shuler, and Ryan Leaf are good examples of quarterback picks in the first round that didn't pan out.
Where's Tebow fit into this?
The Jaguars are being very coy about their interest. They know if he's there and they don't take him, they'll suffer a PR nightmare. They didn't take Brady Quinn because they didn't like the way his mind worked when it came to football and they didn't think he was very accurate.
Tim's mind is all about football when he's on the field. His accuracy is fine and something he can continue to work on. "There are some who don't think he needs to change a thing," Mike Holmgren, President of the Browns said at Pro Day last Wednesday.
That's the direction the Jaguars should be thinking.
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