Sprints Thinks We Should Debate Tim Tebow and Abortion Calmly // 02.02.10
by cocknfire on Feb 2, 2010 1:18 AM EST
in Sprints
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This is more like it
We haven't talked a lot about the Tim Tebow / abortion controversy -- here is a good place to put our AVOID PARTISAN TALK disclaimer -- but since your humble correspondent shot a Howitzer at Sally Jenkins' Lane Kiffin and the BCS column, here's a great one by the avowedly pro-choice columnist:
Tebow's 30-second ad hasn't even run yet, but it already has provoked "The National Organization for Women Who Only Think Like Us" to reveal something important about themselves: They aren't actually "pro-choice" so much as they are pro-abortion. Pam Tebow has a genuine pro-choice story to tell. She got pregnant in 1987, post-Roe v. Wade, and while on a Christian mission in the Philippines, she contracted a tropical ailment. Doctors advised her the pregnancy could be dangerous, but she exercised her freedom of choice and now, 20-some years later, the outcome of that choice is her beauteous Heisman Trophy winner son, a chaste, proselytizing evangelical. ...
Trouble is, you can't focus on the game without focusing on the individuals who play it -- and that is the genius of Tebow's ad. The Super Bowl is not some reality-free escape zone. Tebow himself is an inescapable fact: Abortion doesn't just involve serious issues of life, but of potential lives, Heisman trophy winners, scientists, doctors, artists, inventors, Little Leaguers -- who would never come to be if their birth mothers had not wrestled with the stakes and chosen to carry those lives to term. And their stories are every bit as real and valid as the stories preferred by NOW.
This is, of course, the danger with the larger abortion debate we have in America -- because it is such an emotional issue of "freedom" on one side and "life" on the other, we tend to do a poor job at actually discussing the issues in any calm way. If I have an opinion about the Tebow ad separate from my feelings about abortion -- which I've hopefully avoided revealing -- it's that it allows us to realize that we don't have to scream about these issues to be heard.
It's a long shot, sure. But I'll take all the hope about our political climate that I can get.
McShay gives Tebow a D+
Some Florida fans think Todd McShay has developed some sort of vendetta against their quarterback -- and while I don't agree with them, it's not difficult to see why they believe that.
In a group of merely adequate quarterback prospects, Tebow ranked near the bottom, and we walk away from Mobile believing he might never be an NFL quarterback. He will have to be torn down and rebuilt from the ground up to have a chance, and we cannot remember one NFL quarterback who had to retool his entire game before finding success in the NFL.
So you're saying there's a chance?
He needs to
Tebow has decided what he's going to do about criticisms like that.
There’s been a lot of people that have told me that I couldn’t accomplish my goals -- of being a college quarterback, too. They said I was too short, too slow and too sorry, that I have a long windup. A lot of people are still telling me that I can’t reach my dreams (of playing in the NFL). You know what that does for me? It makes me work that much harder.
That's good. Because whether he likes it or you or I like it or not, pro scouts ignore your college career when deciding whether to draft you. It's not fair, but that's the way it is when it comes to the NFL.
An off-the-Rader choice
Well, Houston Nutt has hired his offensive coordinator. Or co-offensive coordinator, as the case would be.
Rader, 52, was most recently the offensive coordinator at Alabama under Mike Shula from 2003 to 2006. He has spent the last three years working in private business in Tulsa, Okla.
That's right. Ole Miss chose the guy who was offensive coordinator for Mike Shula's powerhouses in Tuscaloosa and then left the business for three years.
"Once I talked to him I knew he still had that itch," Nutt said. "He’s a great teacher and he’s a good recruiter too. He’ll be perfect for our staff."
As long as he views the forward pass as a last resort, I suppose so.
Don't count on Georgia to make an offer
Dawgs fans couldn't get rid of Willie Martinez fast enough; now he's gone from being offered a job at Stanford to getting an offer from Oklahoma. He appears to be en route to Norman.
Your first problem was relying on Bleacher Report. As was your second, third, fourth, fifth ...
Dr. Saturday looks at how the Pitt-to-the-Big-Ten rumors took flight.
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one thing that is a pretty clear demarcation between college and pro
is the focus on the individuals used to “sell” the game to the masses. in college it is the coaches, in pro it is the individual player. every year there are a handful of college players that break this mould and are focused on at the level of a pro player but that’s something of an exception.
that individualization is the key to drawing viewers. think of the amount of people that watch pro games because they like brett farve, or want to see what chad ochocinco is going to do or get at glimpse of peyton manning face and so on and so on. the pregame shows constantly pound on the personalities of the players and take the barest notice of the teams as a whole.
contrast that with college where the teams themselves are much more the topic in the pregame shows and, as such, the leader of the teams – the coaches – are the focal point of the discussion. for a single player to ascend above this and take the center stage so completely – like a pro player – is amazingly rare. but tebow has done this.
thus, the ad is a masterstroke in terms of his strategy of transitioning to the nfl. the players are commodities who ostensibly are there to win games but really are to ensure the continued financial success of the franchise. tebow is a know and very sellable commodity. and if this is the controversy you have to endure – as opposed to, say, dog fights and domestic violence arrests – that not a bad investment for putting butts in the seat.
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by kleph on Feb 2, 2010 9:23 AM EST reply actions 0 recs
What’s interesting to me is that no one outside of its creators and CBS’s censors has actually seen the Tebow ad. There’s a huge difference between a spot saying, “I chose not to abort and look what happened” and, “Write your congressman and tell him to outlaw abortion.” The former is a heartwarming story, while the second advocates a complete turnaround of decades of legal precedent.
I think a lot of the people decrying the ad are assuming it’ll be more like the latter, since that’s essentially the official stance on abortion from Focus on the Family, and that’s the group that paid for the ad. The fact remains though, that no one in the general public actually knows what the ad says. My money is more on the former, because that’s about the only way to get it past the CBS redactors.
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by Year2 on Feb 2, 2010 11:00 AM EST reply actions 0 recs
That’s exactly my thinking – I’d be very surprised if it’s a real bare-knuckled “overturn Roe v Wade now!” political piece, because I can’t believe something like that wouldn’t have been spiked by CBS (which is only just starting to loosen up its stance on advocacy ads.) And I’m not sure Tebow would make an ad like that anyhow – he’s very forthright, certainly, but his approach has always seemed more about the power of example.
by peachy rex on Feb 2, 2010 11:37 AM EST up reply actions 0 recs
Dave Rader.
While not all of our fans have given up on this hire already, it certainly seemed strange.
Whatever. We knew Houston Nutt does goofy stuff.
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by Ivory Tower on Feb 2, 2010 11:59 AM EST reply actions 0 recs
Right on the money
This is, of course, the danger with the larger abortion debate we have in America — because it is such an emotional issue of “freedom” on one side and “life” on the other, we tend to do a poor job at actually discussing the issues in any calm way.
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by wwcmrd? on Feb 2, 2010 4:01 PM EST reply actions 0 recs
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