I know it's a couple of days after the fact, but I have to work for a living and did not want to put up a post until I saw my final "Take a Te-Bow, Tim" montage from all the major TV networks of the season. Here are my thoughts on the national championship game.
- I thought the game was awesome. It had great defense, offense, special teams-- it was just a great game to watch. It was an entertaining game with a little bit of everything. While I wish that Oklahoma had scored one last time in the fourth to make it a one possession game, it was a great ending to another entertaining college football season. I'm also not alone apparently, as it earned the highest ratings in BCS title game history.
-- That being said, it was a really sloppy game. A lot of penalties on both sides, a lot of miscues on the field. The layoff between games has just gotten ridiculous, and it hurts the final product on the field. I'd much prefer wrapping up the games by Jan 3 at the latest.
--Time to address the Tebow situation. Personally, the game was exactly as I expected. He played pretty well, but I will never understand why he's considered such a great player. I understand he's a terrific person and ambassador for the sport, and I understand that he's a proven winner in both high school and college. His resume is great, but I do not get why we consider him to be "arguably the greatest college player ever." While Optimus Prime and I love to make Hoogs spontaneously combust by telling him that Tebow is better than Vince Young, he really seems to be simply an above average quarterback on an excellent team. He isn't all that fast, he isn't all that accurate, in fact the only thing I can see that sets him apart is that when he's tackled he always seems to fall forward for an extra two yards (unless it's 4th and 1 against Ole Miss).
For me, the game solidified that he's not going to make it in the NFL as a quarterback. He's not that fast, so it's not like he's a Vick-esque QB. He never completed any pass longer than 12 yards in the air, his first INT on a throw from the harsh mark to the far sideline showed he doesn't have the arm to make it in the NFL, and his second on a OU zone blitz showed he can't read defenses.
Finally, to all the media members like Scott Van Pelt that are shocked that so many people were rooting for Tebow to fail: understand that you created this monster. The American population is telling you that they are sick of Tim Tebow. Yes, he's a great person, but when he's the only person you talk about for the past three years (it started when he as a RB on the Chris Leak-led 2006 Gators), people get fed up. I'm not going to go into detail about how sickening the treatment of Tebow was during the game, Deadspin and others have already done so, but there is going to be a backlash. People now root for Tim Tebow to fail because it's the only way ESPN, SI, Fox, CBS and anyone else affiliated with sports TV will shut up about him. They don't root against a good kid, they root for whatever scenario will result in hearing about the rest of the players in college football. Remember: he's not even the best skilled position player on their offense, as Percy Harvin showed, let alone the best player in college football.
-- The National Championship was won by the Florida secondary and Brandon Spikes. Watching that game, I thought that Spikes showed that he is going to be the best player from either team in the NFL. He was everywhere-- blitzing, run defense, pass defense-- and was key to shutting down the OU offense juggernaut. The Florida secondary also played lights out the entire game, of course highlighted by Ahmad Black's amazing pick off Jaquian Igeslias. While the goal line stand gets a lot of credit (more on that below), the bigger key to Florida's success was the secondary shutting down TE Jermaine Gresham in the second half. A lot of credit goes to defense coordinator Charlie Strong, even if he does have jungle fever.
-- Oklahoma was going to lose when they were stopped on 4th and 1 from the goal line. When they missed that opportunity to close the game in the first half, you knew it wasn't going to be their night. When they also failed to score after getting second life off a roughing the punter call in the third quarter, when they were stopped again after another predictable off tackle run on third and short, you got that feeling again.
-- People like Kirk Herbstreit have defended Colt McCoy all year by saying that he had less talent around him than Sam Bradford. After watching this game and the Fiesta, I'm not so sure. I think I'll take Crosby and Shipley over just about any WR on the OU roster right now. It only makes Bradford look more impressive in my opinion, since he threw for those ridiculous numbers with only a tight end.
-- If I hear one more person write, "Well, this shows they don't play defense in the Big 12," I'm going to puke. Really? Why don't we say the same thing about the SEC. Georgia (49 points), LSU (51 points), South Carolina (56 points), Vandy (42 points) et al? They all seemed to look pretty pathetic on defense during the season. The two teams that held Florida to it's lowest outputs of the season: Miami and Oklahoma, neither of which are in the SEC. Time to quit the obsession with the SEC, now you're just making excuses for them.
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