No, this isn’t click bait or trolling or whatever other term the cool kids have come up with. It’s a legitimate question given the current state of the Denver roster.
Should they bring back Tim Tebow?
Four years ago, the Broncos had an involuntary case of Tebowmania, thanks to a first-round quarterback John Elway inherited and couldn’t wait to unload, as evidenced by his infamous slow clap after Tebow won a Thursday night game against the Jets with an Antonio Cromartie don’t-raze-me-bro rampage to the end zone. Enter Peyton Manning, exit Tim Tebow, and that was the end of the story.
But the new story has had plenty of twists, with Manning leading the Broncos to the Super Bowl by turning around the passing game, the Broncos getting obliterated by a team with a dominant defense, and Elway deciding he needed to build a dominant defense of his own. He now has, and he’s done such a good job that the Broncos won the Super Bowl with an underwhelming performance from Manning, who finished the year averaging 6.8 yards per pass and throwing nine touchdown passes against 17 interceptions, with a passer rating of 67.9. In 2011, Tebow averaged 6.4 yards per pass, threw 12 touchdown passes against six interceptions, and had a passer rating of 72.9.
He also added 660 rushing yards and six touchdowns; that’s 666 more rushing yards that Manning (minus-6) had this year.
The Broncos’ official website recently declared that the team managed to win a Super Bowl with “sub-optimal, near-replacement-level quarterbacking.” Isn’t that also the official Tim Tebow scouting report?
The fact that Tebow previously played for the Broncos would make it very hard to justify bringing him back. But as Dolphins coach Adam Gase (and Broncos quarterbacks coach in 2011) explained it earlier this year on PFT Live, the key to using Tebow properly is to go all in with him. If the Broncos believe they can win with no passing game -- and given the manner in which Tebow can enhance the running game -- why not at least consider turning the offense over to Tebow and trusting the defense to keep things close?
The chances of it happening are incredibly slim to non-existent. But the fact that the Broncos believe they don’t have to reach to fill out the depth chart makes it far more likely that they’ll sign a free agent (like Ryan Fitzpatrick or Robert Griffin III), use the draft pick that otherwise would go to San Francisco for Colin Kaepernick on a young, cheap player, and maybe even give Trever Siemian a chance to earn the job.
Still, the fact that Tebow could be suggested with a semi-straight face shows how low the bar currently is for the Broncos at the quarterback position.