THERE’S ALWAYS SPORTS RADIO

After my customary break to focus on finishing up the semester strongly (I got two A’s this semester and I am only five classes away from my MBA), I AM BACK!!!! So sit back and enjoy, because I want to discuss a topic that at one point or another has entered the minds of all football fans (NFL and NCAA). That topic is the future of myth and legend that is known as Tim Tebow.

Florida fans and the television powers that be (primarily ESPN & CBS) have had a huge football love affair with this kid since the day he stepped on campus. As a freshman, he was nothing more than a backup fullback (wearing a quarterback’s number) who attempted all of 33 passes that season. Yet for some inexplicable reason, he received more attention than Chris Leak who was Florida’s senior starting quarterback. You may remember him; he was the guy that actually led Florida to the national championship that season. Yet, when mentioning Tebow everyone always says that he won two national championships. I find that to be a bit disingenuous. While Tebow definitely won the National Championship in 2008, saying that he won it 2006 is like saying that Drew Bledsoe won the 2002 Super Bowl for New England, or that Byron Leftwich won the Super Bowl last season. Chris Leak did a lot for that program, and I just hope that when they celebrate the 10-year anniversary of that championship, that they at least invite him to be a part of the festivities.

I also found it quite nauseating that CBS interviewed him on the field immediately after Florida’s SEC Championship Game loss to Alabama. Now, I have watched a lot of college sports in my day, and I can’t recall any other instance where a losing player was interviewed on the field after a game. That usually happens outside of a somber locker room, or in the pressroom, but never on the field. That was Alabama’s moment, and CBS should not have let their obvious love affair with Tebow cast any shadow over Alabama’s celebration. As a matter of fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if CBS tries to pressure AFC teams into drafting him so that they can cover his sure to be brief NFL career.

Although I have been absolutely annoyed by the media coverage that Tebow receives, and equally annoyed by his carefully crafted image (more on that later), I will admit one thing: THIS KID WAS A GREAT COLLEGE FOOTBALL PLAYER! While it is true, that he has had the great fortune of playing on some phenomenal teams at Florida (a school that doesn’t have to recruit, they simply pick who they want), he has made his share of big plays to lead them to victories. His skill set is perfectly suited for the college football game, but not the NFL. He has proven that he can complete passes to receivers who are open by five yards. This happens a lot at Florida because their receivers are simply better than most secondary’s that they line up against. However, in the NFL if a receiver is consistently open by five yards, a defensive back will lose his job. Open in the NFL is basically having your inside shoulder inside of the defender’s inside shoulder. Tebow doesn’t have the arm or accuracy to consistently complete that pass. In college, he also proved to be a tough runner who can simply run through most defenders. If he tries to do that in the NFL, he will quickly be given Google Map directions to a place called injured reserve. Simply put, try that in the NFL and Ray Lewis will break you in half. Trying to run by NFL defenders is also not an option, unless you have the speed of Michael Vick or Vince Young (which Tebow does not). He will quickly learn that the majority of NFL defensive ends are much bigger, faster, and stronger than him. The bottom line is that Tebow is a quarterback with an average arm (can throw far with a lot of air under the ball, but can’t really throw the ball on a rope), who does not possess the skills to be a pocket passer in the NFL. He also isn’t fast enough to be a run/pass threat like Michael Vick, Steve Young, Vince Young, or Randall Cunningham.

I think that I have made it pretty clear that I don’t think that Tim Tebow can play quarterback in the NFL. However, I do feel that there is a place for him in the league. I think he could play an H-back position (sort of a fullback/tight end hybrid), and maybe hold for kicks. Now that I think of it he could possibly excel at being the personal protector for the punter on the punt coverage unit. But quarterback? NOT A CHANCE!

To me, Tim Tebow comes across as a carefully crafted political figure. I just get the vibe that his handlers are already preparing him for a career in politics. He acts like he grew up next door to the Cleavers and is the most wide-eyed and innocent person in college football. There have even been stories of him spending his spring break in third-world countries performing surgical procedures on children. He even writes bible verse, which some people can alter or interpret to be game results (please see picture below).

Is there not a more perfectly crafted image of a wholesome, All-American boy? I’m not buying it. It all seems fake and phony to me. My only advice to him is if you are going to say one thing and portray one thing, you had better live it. There have been several high-profile instances of the exact opposite happening. You don’t want to become one of them.

The bottom line is this. If NFL teams are smart, he will not be drafted before the third round. At that point, the financial commitment will not be devastating if he doesn't pan out. The team that drafts him should immediately make him their H-back. He should have a decent career there. But we all know that's not going to happen. Some team will be stupid enough draft him in the first or second round to play quarterback (it has happened before with less accomplished college quarterbacks). Their thinking is that it will do wonders for their image. They will then learn the hard way that Tim Tebow does not have the ability to play quarterback in the NFL. He will certainly work hard and give it the old “college” try, but after three seasons of sitting on the bench or failing miserably on the field (depending on how stupid the coach is), Tim Tebow will begin his second career which is indeed his true calling. He will be a sports-radio host in Gainesville Florida, where he will always be considered a god. Hey, it worked for Buck Belue.

AND NOW FOR MY BALLER & SCRUB OF THE WEEK:

BALLER: John Wall (PG University of Kentucky) – He is simply the best player in college basketball. Over the past week, he has led Kentucky to victories over North Carolina, Connecticut, and Indiana. This kid is amazing. If you haven’t seen him play yet, make some time and check him out. He is definitely worth it. However, if you want to see him in college you had better hurry up because he will only be there one season. I hope his one season in Lexington leads to a National Championship.

BALLER: Mark Ingram (RB University of Alabama) – Although I am not an Alabama fan, Mark Ingram is by far my favorite college football player. He plays the game the way it should be played. He is a hard runner that can run by defenders, but would much rather run through them. I also have never seen him run out of bounds to avoid contact. He’s so tough that he makes you forget that Shaun Alexander (softest NFL RB in recent history) once played for Bama. Ingram definitely deserved to win the Heisman. Congratulations!

SCRUB: Tiger Woods (Professional Golfer) – I know that he isn’t the first person or high-profile athlete to cheat on his wife, but he is the latest to learn that eventually the mistresses will come out and say something. While I am disappointed in him for his “transgressions” as he likes to call them, I am not surprised. I mean, he was a filthy rich man who married a trophy wife. Did anyone really think that there was real love and respect there? Unfortunately, this type of thing happens all the time. He is a famous and wealthy guy who thinks that all of these women want him for his looks and charisma. I find that funny because to me he simply seems to be a corny dude who happens to be great at golf (which has made him extremely wealthy). He is waaayyyy to lame to think that he could pull off this lifestyle long-term. He had to know that eventually he would get caught. If not, shame on him.

SCRUB: Tim Tebow (QB University of Florida) – After your team got slaughtered by Alabama, you were on the sidelines crying like a little girl that didn’t get the bike she wanted for Christmas. I just want to know if you were crying because you lost the game, or because you realized that your athletic career would be all down-hill from there? Either way it goes, save it for the locker room. The man, the myth, and the legend that is Tim Tebow should not be seen crying after losing a game.

WHAT? HE MISSED!

Kickers, Kickers, Kickers. There is one thing that I have always noticed about kickers on a football team. From the outside looking in, it really doesn’t appear that they are actually a part of the team. This is at all levels of football. The kickers, punters, and the long snapper (if he doesn’t also play another position) usually camp out during the game in their own little world that usually exists at the back of the sideline near the 30 or 35 yard line. Why is it that way? I really don’t know. Do the other players on the team not respect them? Do the other players on the team simply dislike them? Is there some rule in the football rulebook that specifies where kickers must stand on the sideline and how far they must be from the nearest teammate? Are players scared that if they stand too close to a kicker that their kids will grow up and become kickers? Someone please answer this question for me.

I am a daily listener to NFL radio (I was actually on air last Saturday, which was AWESOME!!!! because it is so hard to get through). One of the things that I like about NFL radio is that players and coaches tend to be very candid during interviews. I guess they let their guard down and say what is really on their mind because there are no cameras in their face. Usually television interviews with athletes go as Andre 3000 describes a bad rap battle in TWO DOPE BOYS IN A CADILLAC, they simply “spit (or in this case talk) and stumble of clichés” without really saying anything. However, on the radio they tend to be more likely to talk as if they are hanging out with friends at a bar while shooting pool and enjoying the beverage of their choice. It is very rare that any player interviewed on the radio speaks glowingly of their kicker (with the rare exception being Colts clutch kicker Adam Vinatieri). As a matter of fact when anything relating to a kicker comes up, I have hear many players simply laugh and say that they don’t pay the kicker any attention and that he should just stay out of everyone else’s way. A lot of them won’t even comment on anything kicker related.

Without a doubt, kickers have the most and least job security of any position in the NFL. A great kicker can kick FOREVER!!!! Five of the seven oldest players in NFL history were kickers (this includes George Blanda who was also a quarterback, but was a kicker for the final nine years of his 26 year career). For a less than spectacular kicker, your job is basically week-to-week. There have been several instances where a kicker has been cut following a bad game or they show up at practice Wednesday and there is a new guy there that you must compete with to keep your job.

Over my 28 years on this earth, I have seen more football than you can ever imagine. I have witnessed my fair share of blowouts as well as close games. Most of the close games that I have witnessed have come in the NFL, where the average margin of victory is less than a touchdown. The outcome of these close games sometimes rest on the mismatched shoe foot of a kicker. This fact makes me wonder, “Can a kicker lose a football game?”

I have heard several answers to this question. There is the school of thought that says that you can’t place the blame solely on a kicker for losing a football game, when the rest of the team could have done better during the rest of the game. Some NFL players take this perspective after a kicker has missed a potentially game winning kick. They try to deflect the blame from the player whose name they probably don’t even know, and place it on the entire team. I feel that is the admirable thing to do, because the last thing that you want is a kicker with confidence issues. I have also heard people say that kickers can’t lose a football game because they feel as though no kick is automatic. These people feel like it is up to the other players on the football team to play well enough to win the game, and that anything the kicker does (besides extra points) are a bonus. I even had one person tell me that not only can kickers lose the game, but he went so far as to wonder how the game of football would be without kickers altogether. While that may appear to be a ridiculous thought on the surface, after further discussion, I realized that he might be on to something (more on that thought to come in a later entry).

As most of you know I watch a great deal of NFL, NBA, and College Basketball games. I also watch some college football, but Saturday afternoons are usually reserved for homework and around the house activities. I say this because watching each of these sports has helped me to realize one of the biggest differences between the college and professional versions of basketball and football. College basketball is full of bad free throw shooting. I know that there are some terrible free throw shooters in the NBA (mostly power forwards & centers), but as a whole the free throw shooting is pretty good. In college basketball on the other hand, most players are pretty bad, especially in clutch situations. As far as college football goes, the field goal kicking leaves a lot to be desired. Except for the one or two kickers a year that eventually make the NFL, any field goal of 35 yards is an adventure. I am not surprised because there are close to 120 Division I (or whatever they call division 1 nowadays) football teams, plus countless others at other levels. With that many teams, you can’t expect all of them to have great kickers.

The NFL on the other hand is different. There are only 32 teams. While most teams carry 3 quarterbacks, 5 running backs/fullbacks, 6 wide receivers, and countless others at each position, THEY ONLY CARRY ONE PLACE KICKER! I specifically said “place kicker” because many place kickers in the NFL only have one job. That job is to kick field goals. A great deal of them, DON’T EVEN KICK OFF! They have a “kickoff specialist” to handle that. This means that there are only 32 people on the entire planet who are employed by NFL teams to kick field goals. Since this is such a small number, you would think that these are without a doubt the best in the world at this craft. With that being said, I feel as though A KICKER CAN MOST DEFINITELY LOSE A FOOTBALL GAME!

For an NFL kicker there are some kicks that should simply be automatic if there is a good snap, the ball is cleanly placed down with the laces turned out, and the offensive line does not let anyone through. While I acknowledge that some things are simply out of the kickers control, if the aforementioned events go without a hitch, ALL NFL KICKERS SHOULD MAKE EVERY EXTRA POINT THEY ATTEMPT! If the game is being played outdoors where mother nature can cause other variables to come into play, an NFL kicker SHOULD MAKE EVERY FIELD GOAL INSIDE OF FORTY YARDS! This means that if the offense gets the ball to the 22 yard line, there is no excuse for a missed kick (for those that don’t know, the actual distance of a field goal is 17 yards longer than the spot from which the ball is snapped, because the ball is kicked seven yards from where it is snapped and the goalposts are located 10 yards past the goal line). Inside of a dome where it never rains, the field is never muddy, there is no wind, the sun never causes any type of glare or shadows, and it is always a comfortable 72 degrees, an NFL kicker SHOULD MAKE ALL KICKS INSIDE OF 50 YARDS! This means that the offense is responsible for getting the ball to the opponent’s 32 yard line (which would be a 49 yard field goal for all of you non-math majors). While I know that no one is perfect and that every kicker will miss some kicks in their careers, they must be held responsible if the snap, hold, and blocking is good and they miss any extra point, or any kick inside of 40 yards outdoors or inside of 50 yards outdoors. While many NFL kickers can make 50+ yard field goals, no team should reasonably expect their kickers to make kicks from this distance. If a kicker happens to make a 50+ yard kick, the team should be elated and consider those points as a nice bonus, because it is totally unrealistic to expect your kicker to regularly make a kick from that distance.

I have absolutely no tolerance for kickers who let their team down by missing what should be makeable field goals. Most of them have one job on the football team and get paid a minimum of $310,000 per season, with some earning several million dollars per season. While it isn’t quarterback money, but it is certainly a nice living to DO ONE THING! In fact, I wonder if kickers even get a playbook like the rest of the team, or do they simply get a 3x5 index card that says, “Kick the ball between the uprights”? Really, they don’t have any plays. There is the occasional fake field goal, but even on that play the kicker simply goes through his normal kicking motion making it look as realistic as possible.

The only thing that place kickers ever do is kick the football. They do regular conditioning, weight training (at least on their lower body), and stretching. Other than that, they simply kick. Every NFL team has a special teams segment in practice where all of their special teams units practice their blocking and kick coverage. This is also when kickers get a chance to work on their kicking. Not only can they practice during the special teams segment of practice, but I don’t see why they can’t continue practicing their kicking during the nine-on-seven (run game practice) and seven-on-seven (pass game practice) segments of practice because most, if not all NFL teams have multiple fields at their practice facilities. They obviously aren’t needed during these segments, so they could get more reps on a separate field. They also have their very own kicking net on the sidelines that they can use to ensure that their steps are correct and that they make good contact with the ball. NFL teams certainly have enough resources to enable kickers to work on their craft as much as they would like to.

In no way, shape, or form am I diminishing the skill that it takes to be an NFL kicker. It is an extremely difficult job that only 32 people in the entire world have. But what I am doing is not letting them off the hook for missing field goals that professionals should make. Just like quarterbacks get blamed for missing wide open receivers (or in the case of Jason Campbell, refusing to throw to wide open receivers that are more than 15 yards away from you), and running backs get blamed for loosing fumbles, and Keith Brooking gets blamed for missing tackle opportunities in front of the first down marker, kickers should be blamed when they mess up as well.

I have arrived at several NFL games early enough to see the kickers warm up (which usually happens before the rest of the team warms up). These kickers can routinely make 70+ yard field goals in warm-ups, which show just how strong and accurate their legs are. Yes, I know that warm-up conditions are totally pressure free unlike the real games. But at least we know what they are capable of. To be a good NFL kicker, you must have nerves of steel (especially on the road) and be able to concentrate on the task at hand. While this is pressure, it is no different than what a quarterback must do when throwing a pass with 250 – 300 pound defenders diving at you to take your head off. It is also no different from what wide receivers must deal with while going over the middle to catch a pass that was thrown a tad bit high. It is also no different than the pressure that any Green Bay Packer tackle was under when facing Jared Allen this season (can you believe he had 7.5 sacks against the Packers in two games this season). Bottom line is that everyone on the football field is under intense pressure during the game (except for maybe the kickoff specialist, which is by the way the best job in all of sports). The ability to not only handle, but also thrive under that pressure is why they are in the NFL. Whether or not these players thrive under the pressure or succumb to it will ultimately decide the fate of their team, and KICKERS OR NO DIFFERENT!


ON A TOTALLY UNRELATED NOTE: I have had the misfortune of seeing the Washington Redskins play a few times this year. Am I the only one that notices that Jason Campbell looks as if he is expecting to get sacked each time he drops back to pass? Pay attention to him the next time you see the Redskins play or highlights of him getting sacked on SportScenter. It looks as though he takes the snap; looks for his first read (who is either covered or too far for him to get the ball to him) and then immediately balls up into the tornado drill position that you had to do in elementary school and waits to get hit. I’m not making this up. Check it out.

AND NOW FOR MY BALLER AND SCRUB OF THE WEEK:

BALLER: Jamal Crawford (Atlanta Hawks) – My Atlanta Hawks are off to a 5 – 2 start. It has definitely been a total team effort. Josh Smith and Al Horford are playing out of their minds. Joe Johnson is being the regular season Joe Johnson that we all know and love (the post-season Joe Johnson is an entirely different issue). Marvin Williams is still making me wonder why we drafted him over Chris Paul and Deron Williams (my therapist is helping me to get over my hang up on that issue). But the engine that is currently making the Hawks go is sixth-man extraordinaire, Jamal Crawford. He is averaging 18 points per game off the bench and is given the Hawks the secondary scorer that they thought they drafted in Marvin Williams (sorry, I am really working on this). If he keeps up this pace, my Hawks will be hard to beat and will certainly get a crack at Boston in the Eastern Conference Finals.

This week I couldn’t decide between two candidates for Scrub of the Week, so I decided to honor them both.

SCRUB: The NFL’s Southeast Division (better known as the SEC) Officials – Although I don’t watch nearly as much college football as I do NFL football, I do occasionally enjoy a good college football game. One game that I am definitely looking forward to is the SEC Championship Game. I would love to see a rematch of last year’s game and see Alabama play Florida. Obviously the SEC feels the same way that I do, because their officials have made terrible calls or no-calls for both Florida and Alabama this season. Just yesterday, they disallowed an interception of Alabama by LSU by saying that the LSU player never got his foot down inbounds after catching the ball. While watching the game live, I definitely saw that he indeed did get the required one foot down in bounds. Then CBS showed countless replays from several angles, that all showed that his foot was down. The most daunting evidence that was ignored by the officials was the divot left in the grass by the LSU player when HIS FOOT CAME DOWN INBOUNDS! In the same game, the officials missed an obvious facemask (hands to the face penalty) by an Alabama defensive lineman that grabbed a LSU offensive lineman’s facemask and used it to drive him back so that he could get to the quarterback. I don’t know how they missed that one, the kid’s head snapped back. I’m not saying that the outcome of the game would have been any different had the correct call been made in these situations, but it would have been nice to let the players and coaches on the field decide. The officials in this game definitely had a HUGE affect on the outcome. It really shouldn’t be that way.

We all know that Tim Tebow (I can’t wait until he gets exposed in the NFL) is the chosen one and that his ticket to Atlanta for the SEC Championship game was punched when Spring Practice started, but now the SEC is even hand picking his opponent. This is ridiculous. The NCAA has to take a look at the poor quality of SEC officiating and their obvious biases, and step in and do something. The SEC obviously has an agenda and has empowered their officials with the ability to ensure that their agenda comes to fruition.

SCRUB: Elizabeth Lambert (New Mexico Women’s Soccer Team) – I know the last names are slightly different, but I wonder if she is related to Bill Laimbeer.

Check out the video.