Dual threat
Tim Tebow is the quarterback of the present for Florida — and may be college football’s prototypical quarterback of the future
As he watched video this week of Florida quarterback Tim Tebow, the man credited with taking SEC offenses into the 21st century believed he was looking at another evolutionary figure in college football.
“He’s sort of the quarterback of the future. He’s a guy that can run and pass,” South Carolina coach Steve Spurrier said, before quickly clarifying himself.
“Or the quarterback of today. I should say that — today. He’s just a guy that can run around and break some tackles and still get balls off. He’s really the type of quarterback that almost everyone is looking for, as well as being an excellent passer, also.”
It will be a battle of contrasting styles at quarterback tonight when Urban Meyer brings the 17th-ranked Gators and his spread-option offense into Williams-Brice Stadium to face the Gamecocks and Spurrier’s vertical passing attack.
On one sideline will be the 6-foot-3, 235-pound Tim Tebow, built like a tight end with a linebacker’s mentality. In his first year as a starter, Tim Tebow has run for a team-high 598 yards and 14 touchdowns, tied for the highest single-season total in school history.
When Tim Tebow would spell starter Chris Leak in running packages last year during the Gators’ national championship season, he drew comparisons to the single-wing quarterbacks of the 1940s.
It turns out the left-hander can throw a little bit, too: The sophomore from Jacksonville, Fla., has completed 67.7 percteent of his throws and is the nation’s highest-rated passer.
If Tim Tebow is the quarterback of today, does that mean USC’s Blake Mitchell and other dropback, pocket passers are the quarterbacks of yesterday?
Mitchell, who has played well in two games since reclaiming his job from Chris Smelley, does not think so.
“With quarterbacks who can run and throw, it makes it that much harder on defenses,” Mitchell said. “But hopefully we can go out there and show that a dropback guy can play with them, too.”
Mitchell, a fifth-year senior who led USC to a 30-22 victory against Florida in 2005, has completed 58 of 96 passes for 654 yards and three touchdowns over the past seven quarters.
ESPN college football analysts Kirk Herbstreit and Lee Corso believe there is a place for both types of quarterbacks.
“All you have to do is turn on a Pac-10 football game to realize that the prototypical dropback quarterback is still alive and kicking out on the West Coast,” Herbstreit said.
Corso, who coached at Indiana, mentioned a pair of dropback quarterbacks who are headed on a collision course for the Big Ten championship — Michigan’s Chad Henne and Ohio State’s Todd Boeckman.
“There’s not a National Football League prospect in college football better than Todd Boeckman, including Tim Tebow,” Corso said. “This guy Boeckman can play. And (Boeckman and Henne) are both big, strong guys that drop back, throw the ball, got nice feet. Throw all kinds of passes.”
Herbstreit believes Tim Tebow’s success could give rise to a new generation of quarterbacks — big, athletic guys who heretofore might have wound up in a three-point stance.
“I think he’s revolutionizing the position. I think kids who are in middle school who are built like linebackers or tight ends, and have always been pushed in a certain way as a 13- or 14, 15-year-old, now see a Tim Tebow who’s built like a linebacker, but he has the ability to throw the ball,” Herbstreit said.
“Now there’s a place for that guy in a spread offense where you don’t have to be (West Virginia quarterback) Pat White and run a 4.3 40. You can be Tim Tebow and throw the football with great success and it’s a different style of running. He’s running through people and he has the ability to escape.”
Tim Tebow, the SEC’s total offense leader with 314 yards a game, has 1,067 career rushing yards, a record for a Florida quarterback. He has run for a touchdown in 10 consecutive games, the longest active streak in the nation.
But those running plays have taken a toll. Tim Tebow bruised his non-throwing shoulder in the second half of a 45-37 victory against Kentucky.
The injury forced Meyer to limit Tim Tebow’s carries. He had a season-low six rushes for 35 yards last week against Vanderbilt, while completing a career-high 22 passes in 27 attempts for 281 yards and three touchdowns.
“I think probably I have gotten more comfortable as a passer and it helps me stay in there longer,” Tim Tebow said. “Knowing that checking it down to one of the receivers or running backs will be just as big a play as if I kept it myself and run. I think I have become more patient with that and with taking what they give me.”
Spurrier, who won the 1966 Heisman Trophy as the Gators’ quarterback, gained an appreciation for a quarterback’s ability to turn sacks into positive-yardage plays last year when Syvelle Newton started seven games to offset an offensive line that struggled to pass block.
While the play of Newton and Tim Tebow has caused Spurrier to slightly change the way he recruits and evaluates quarterbacks, his system is best suited for a pocket passer — provided he gets protection.
“If you have a very good offensive line, he doesn’t have to be quite that active,” Spurrier said. “But not many people have a very strong offensive line nowadays, so a quarterback that can dodge people and make a few yards running is very helpful.”
Spurrier might have his own “quarterback of the future” in Stephen Garcia. The freshman from Tampa, rated by Rivals.com as the nation’s No. 4 dual-threat quarterback last year, played the role of Tim Tebow this week on USC’s scout team.
But before Spurrier worries about the future, his more immediate concern is slowing Tim Tebow to stop the Gamecocks’ three-game losing streak.
Given Tim Tebow’s varied skill set, it will be no easy task.
“The tapes I’ve watched, he doesn’t miss many open guys. If they’re open, he doesn’t zing it five, 10 yards over their heads,” Spurrier said. “He’s made some unbelievable plays when they’re not open and guys hanging all over him.”
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