Tim Tebow shuts down haters, reveals his primary focus for the season
As Double-A baseball players who made their names in other sports go, Tim Tebow has been better than Michael Jordan.
But as he prepared to play Wednesday night in the Eastern League All-Star Game at Arm & Hammer Park in Trenton, New Jersey, Tebow wasn’t focused on that.
He was, as he has been all season, focused on simply improving his game and being the best player he can be.
Which, considering all the hype swirling around a potential September call-up to the New York Mets, is a curious attitude to have.
“I can’t worry about any of that,” Tebow told Newsday when asked about just that possibility.
“I know as a baseball player I have a lot of room to grow and I think I’m getting better every day and every series,” he said. “I know I’m not even close to where I want to be.”
Tebow was last seen on an NFL roster in the 2015 preseason, when the Philadelphia Eagles cut him on Sept. 6 as part of the final cut-down before that season began.
The last time he played in a football game was 2012, and then not even as a quarterback; the Jets used him situationally as a fullback and tight end.
But if he makes it to the Mets, he will be the first player to appear in a regular-season game in both sports since Drew Henson appeared first with the Yankees in 2002 and ’03 and then later with the Cowboys and Lions in 2004 and ’08, becoming the second-most notable quarterback on the 2000 Michigan Wolverines behind some kid who ended up drafted in the sixth round by the Patriots.
Tebow has had a breakout season in the minors this year; over the past month, his hitting has been on fire, and he has raised his season average to .270 with a .727 OPS.
Last year, at various levels of Class A ball, he hit just .226, still better than Jordan’s .200 in Birmingham in 1994-95 but inviting his haters to call his place on the roster nothing but a publicity stunt.
Of the All-Star selection itself, Tebow told Newsday, “It was a great honor and something I really appreciated.”
“It was really fun,” he said. “I think everybody really enjoyed it. I thought the atmosphere was great. I felt good at the plate. I think I put together a lot of good swings and felt ‘on’ a lot of pitches.”
Tebow went 1-for-4 in the game, batting ninth as the Eastern Division’s designated hitter, and the hit went for extra bases, a double that, in a nice bit of synergy with his season stats, gave him a small-sample-size .250 average and .750 OPS.
Football players have a famously grueling training regimen, one less suited to building stamina and more suited to preparing to, once a week, leave everything on the field.
Baseball, on the other hand, has more in common with marathon running than decisive pitched battle, its seasons at all levels above Short Season A running over a hundred games.
Tebow, talking about that change in training regimen, spoke to the difference.
“I think even last year, being my first year in baseball, I still didn’t know how my body was adjusting to playing every day for 150 games in a row, versus trying to get ready for 16 Sundays,” he said. “This year, I think I prepared a lot better and my body has adjusted and been a little more steady throughout.”
So steady, in fact, that the last-place Mets, a team going nowhere and seemingly ages removed from its 2015 World Series appearance, might just have Tebow playing professional sports in New York once again.
Just don’t tell Tim Tebow that. He’s just out there doing work and trying to get better.
Truth and Accuracy
We are committed to truth and accuracy in all of our journalism. Read our editorial standards.
