In the immediate hours following the Denver Bronco’s 17-13 win over the New York Jets, one name has, unjustly, resonated across all sporting networks. Scoring the game winning touchdown with 58 seconds to play, Tim Tebow found 20 yards which would win the game, but what about the other 3542 seconds?
Completing 9 of 20 passes for 104 yards and rushing for an additional 68 which included the game winning touchdown, Tebow had done very little leading into the final quarter to suggest he was going to win the game.
Backing up his 112 yard game last week with this week’s 172 yard game, Tebow is impressively winning games with little productivity. Herein lies the mistakes of commentators, news networks and radio stations. Tebow is not winning these games despite the Bronco’s being 4-1 with him as starter.
His defence and special teams are. Yet he is copiously described as “magical”, “inspirational” and “wonderkid”. He may be all of these, but if so, his defence walks on water.
Assessing the entirety of all four quarters, Tebow did not complete half his passes, many of which were uncatchable. He converted only three third downs including just one in the first three quarters from 13 attempts and completed only two downfield passes for more than ten yards.
So if Tebow gave such a mediocre performance how did the Bronco’s win this game? The answer is thanks to their defence.
The old football adage of ‘defence wins games’ was none truer than on Thursday night. Keeping the Jets to just three third down conversions from 14 attempts, the Bronco’s defence led by rookie Von Miller repeatedly stoped the Jets offence, returning the ball to Tim Tebow for another opportunity. It was only a matter of time before Tebow would make a big play from repeated attempts.
With a game high nine tackles, three for a loss, 1.5 sacks for 12 sack yards, one forced fumble, one pass deflected and four quarterback hits, Miller delivered the greatest defensive rookie performances in recent history which has been unfortunately been overshadowed by Tim Tebow.
Added to Miller’s phenomenal performance, Andre Goodman picked off Jets QB Mark Sanchez to return it for a touchdown.
In many ways the Jets lost this game with two missed field goals, a shanked punt and a mistimed snap which cost them 20 yards at a critical juncture.
Playing defence has always been a thankless job, but with media and fan favourite Tebow now leading this team, the Bronco’s defence should get use to it. So much has Tebow reinvigorated football in Denver, his act of ‘Tebowing’ (http://tebowing.com/) has led fans to photograph themselves preying randomly in assorted locations.
Tim Tebow remains one of the most exciting players in the league to watch but please stop hailing him as “magical”. He has been involved in four wins and one loss since being handed the starting job and much of those wins are thanks to his defence and special teams.
He may have scored the game winning touchdown, but Tim Tebow did not win that game against the Jets on Thursday Night Football.
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