A God among Men: Tim Tebow

I don't listen to music in my car, haven't for a long time.  Sure, maybe if I've just gotten out of the studio, I might listen to a CD of me, check the levels, the mix, bask in my awesomeness, that sort of thing.  But usually if I am in my car, heading to the market to pick up meat or to pick up my boy from daycare, there is only one thing I listen to on my radio: sports talk.

Drives Justine nuts.  She says it just sounds like men shouting at each other.  Well, perhaps, to the untrained ear it does...  OK, actually it is men shouting at each other. Because this is sports, and sports is serious shit.

Everyone has their favorites.  I like Colin Cowherd, who I know a lot of my sporting friends hate.  But I think the guy is pretty fucking clever for a sports' show host. Like today, he was talking about Guns 'n' Roses' induction into the Rock 'n' Roll Hall of Fame (they don't only talk about sports), and he was complaining about how lame rock 'n' roll has become and how there are no good bands left.  Which isn't true of course, but guys like Colin Cowherd aren't going to know about the Gaslight Anthem or the Hold Steady.  He's a mainstream radio guy.  He knows mainstream rock radio.  In other words, Nickelback.  That's got to be an awful existence, if you think about it.  One day you have G 'n' R, and the next you have...Nickelback. That's scarier than an original Grimm fucking Fairy Tale ending.  Can't say I'm a big fan of the NB.  I mean, who is?  The same douches who like Daughtry, maybe.  I would never normally post a Nickelback video, except this one is pretty funny.  It's two of their hits played simultaneously, which you can clearly hear makes them the same song. Does it get any lower than stealing from yourself?  Yeah, it does. Stealing from yourself when you suck to begin with.  Christ, if you're going to steal, steal from someone good.

Cowherd went on to start making fun of Maroon 5.  He had a couple lines I wished I'd come up with.  One was when he went on this rant ending with "go make out with your arm."  That was a good one.  Then he was bashing their latest single.  "It's called 'Move Like Jagger,' but it sounds like Boltin."  It's sports talk radio.  Trust me, that's a irreverent as it's getting.

There's a bunch of these guys on the air, local and syndicated.  I tend to go mostly local, although Cowherd is national.  In the Bay Area, you got the dinosaurs like Gary Radnich, and then there's the new fm station, The Game.  Most of the hosts there are ex-footballers, like Eric Davis, who co-hosts an afternoon show with Brandon Tierney.  Together they are: Tierney and Davis, "The Drive."  Pretty fucking cool.

I don't care where in America you are, you can always find a sports talk station, and you don't even need to be a big sports' fan to appreciate it.  But you probably need a penis.  Women all seem to hate sports talk.  My friend Dan doesn't even like sports all that much, or rather, it doesn't entirely consume his existence like it does mine. Still, he can appreciate some good sports radio and yelling.  Because he has a penis.

I am not that keen on using this blog to proselytize or philosophize.  I have one real theme I like to explore here.

But I won't be the first guy to draw the parallel between sports and war.  Just Google those two terms and you have about a billion pages of articles written by nerds who have been a part of neither, showing irrefutable evidence that that we men use sports as a substitute for war.  I guess there used to be more wars back in the olden days and we are compensating.  Though, I admit there is a compelling, if obvious, correlation.

Especially when it comes to football.  You've probably seen the old George Carlin bit comparing baseball and football, but just in case it's been a while.

It's football season now.  And with the NBA lockout, there was even more NFL than usual this season.  Nothing stokes the testosterone fires, makes the plums swell plumper than football.

And lately, it's all been about Tim Tebow.

If you don't follow sports, you still probably heard the name.  The guy is like a fucking living saint (with extremely below average throwing mechanics).  An evangelical Christian, he has like an entire missionary or something down in Africa, where he heals the lame, restores sight to the blind, and makes wholesome pro-life commercials with his mom.  Dude is a lightening rod.

Tim Tebow is the starting QB for the Denver Broncos.  He got the job when the fans demanded a change.  It's the only time I can think of where a fan base dictated a starting line-up change to a front office vehemently opposed to said change (check the video at the end of this post).

That's the sign that the Denver Broncos' fans paid for earlier in the year when the team was an uninspiring1-4 with Kyle Orton as starting QB.  The weird thing is that even though the team has gone 6-1 since Tebow took over, Orton is the vastly superior quarterback, at least in terms of throwing the ball and hitting his target, which is kind of what the whole QB position is all about; yet, the team sucked balls with Orton under center.  When the fans finally managed to convince ownership to start Tebow, a first-round draft choice out of Florida, the Broncos miraculously started winning, emphasis on the "miraculous" part.

You might think, even if you're not that big into football but at least can recognize that being a first-round pick must mean you are pretty good, the guy must have something going for him if he's in the NFL and was selected that high.  Kind of. First off, he was taken by Josh McDaniels, one of the worse NFL hires ever, but yeah, Tim's got something.  Intangibles.

"Intangibles" is usually a brush off, a damning with faint praise, like saying the chunky gal has a swell personality; in sports "intangibles" is agent-speak when you're trying to land a fat 4-year contract for a 36-year-old guy who batted .271 last year.  But how else do you explain the Denver Broncos' now being in first place? Critics of Tebow say it's the defense.  Sure, it is.  But this was the same D that sucked with Orton.  It's either extremely fortuitous and coincidental (and I don't believe in the latter), or something about Tebow elevates everyone else's game.  The dude is a winner, been doing it at every level of football, his whole life, just listen to the radio.

One of my favorite things to do on Sunday, after Tebow pulls another one out of his ass while completing like 2 passes for a QB rating just this side of Charlie Brown, is to post on my friend Duane's Facebook page.  I'll say something like, "Still hating Tebow?"  Which always elicits a very animated response from Duane, who thinks of Tebow the way I think of Jane Austen (hint: it involves a lot of donkey dick sucking).

I don't hate Tim Tebow, and it has nothing to do with his being on my fantasy team (though Tebow is fantasy gold.  Because he can't throw for shit, more often than not coverage breaks down and he runs, which is good for garbage fantasy points).  I should hate the guy.  For one, he is ridiculously wholesome.  I mean, capital G fucking Good.  The guy is, like, 24, and still a virgin.  This was his girlfriend, and he did not stick his penis in her.  Like, not even the tip.

Don't ask me how.  Tim just really loves Jesus, I guess.  The other day, after yet another improbable come-from-behind victory, a commentator asked Tebow the best part of his day, and you know what Tim says?  Something about having visited a sick kid in a hospital.  I shit you not.  Normally, guys this goody-goody make me wanted to get tested for the clap again.

I am just not a very good person.  I'm not the worst.  But I'm just not very good.  I'm selfish and immature, and I'll hold a grudge for, like, forever.  Like Jimmy the Gent, I watched cops and robbers' movies as a kid and rooted for the criminal.  Fuck, I read newspaper articles about cops and robbers now, and I'm usually pulling for the crook.  A guy like Tim Tebow should only remind me of my shortcomings.  Except for some reason, when I am watching the Broncos play, a team I neither like nor dislike, I find myself rooting for them, even getting chills when they make a big play.  I am 49ers' fan.  I do not get chills watching Alex Smith play.  I used to.  But that was mostly from cold-sweat vomiting thinking we could have had Aaron Rodgers (Alex Smith has been much better this year, though SF will never--and I repeat never--win a Championship with that dillweed as signal caller).

This is from the NY Post yesterday: http://tinyurl.com/756e6uc.  The article is a little tongue in cheek, but a lot of what the author says is true, as it espouses on the appeal and upstanding attributes of the Broncos' QB.  Tim Tebow won't be raping women in a nightclub, nor will be shooting someone with his glock in the parking lot of a Cheetahs.  I am not a big fan of your typical, holier-than-thou Christian (I consider myself a Christian, but I'm not like those mutherfuckers).  Still, I get a little sick every offseason reading about some NFL dumbass, pulling a gun, and shooting somebody in a crowded, well-lit place.

Tim Tebow is a guy you can root for.  There.  I said it.  I admit it.  I am on the bandwagon.  I am fan.  The man can't throw a fucking football to save his life. Seriously, he looks like your little sister in the backyard.  If your sister was a retarded duck.  But every Monday morning, when I head down to my home gym in the basement, after Tim and Co., against the odds, manage to win another ugly, ugly game, I look forward to turning on the sports talk radio and listening to the pundits scream at each other as I climb the elliptical.  Well, I don't actually listen to sports radio on the radio.  They have it on the TV, too.  Yeah.  How Cro-Magnon awesome is my life? Sports talk radio on the radio, and sports talk radio on the TV. I can feel my balls swelling as I write this.