Humanity and Transcendence of Football

Tim Tebow

Tim Tebow is a good person, no doubt, a lovely human being.  But he's a lousy QB, I said recently.  Still, to my point perhaps, he is virtually transcendent about the tough situation he's in, fighting to secure a roster spot with the Patriots.  Quizzically he didn't play in their preseason game last week, which is not a good sign.  Perhaps not so quizzical, as he hasn't played all that well in the lead-up to the season.

Three days in advance of the New England Patriots' preseason finale, quarterback Tim Tebow says he doesn't have a sense of what his fate with the team will be.

"I'm just focused on today," he said Monday.

"[It's] just another game," Tebow said. "You focus not even on that game, but preparing for that game, focus on today, the install and having a good practice."

"I love playing; I love competing," he said. "Everybody does in this locker room. We all love the game; that's why we're here. You just want to not focus on that, but focus on the preparation right now, and that'll take care of itself."

"I learned very early on in my career at Florida to worry about what I can control," he said. "And the things that I can't control, I'm not going to spend time worrying about. But I can control my attitude, my effort, my focus every single day, and those are things I'm going to worry about."

Reference: Tim Tebow 'just focused on today'.

Martellus Bennett

We as fans, or even the media, forget about the personal side of football.  We hardly see it.  All we see are the lithe athletes on the field, who really ought to be more like lumbering, anonymous gladiators for the load of gear they wear and hide behind.  Still, Martellus Bennett gives us a glimpse of what it means to be quintessentially human in such a sport.     

Martellus Bennett picked up the phone shortly after the team’s 6 a.m. arrival Saturday from the trip to Oakland, Calif., and called fellow tight end Fendi Onobun, who was feeling down after dropping what should have been a touchdown during Chicago’s 34-26 win over the Raiders.

“I told him, ‘Come by the crib,’” Bennett explained.

“I was just telling him that I think he just gets to the point where he just thinks football, football, football,” Bennett said. “But you can lose yourself. Football is not who we are; it’s what we do. Sometimes, when it becomes who you are, you kind of lose yourself. Every little thing that goes wrong with it, it affects you in a major way instead of (you) being able to deal with the adversity. Bad stuff happens in football. You’re going to have the drops.”

“I don’t want to say (he was) too rattled,” Bennett said. “It’s just one of those things like you go out there, you work so hard every single day. He stays after (practice) catching the ball. He wants to do so well. You want to do so well. (When) things don’t go the way you want it to go, it affects him to another level than it does other guys.”

“We just sat down. We talked hours and hours, not just (about) football, but life in general,” Bennett said. “I told him, ‘Don’t let people use (your basketball background) as an excuse for you. You’ve been bouncing around the league a couple of years now. You can’t use that as a crutch. You’re a smart guy, graduated college.’ I didn’t graduate college, but he’s not smarter than me. He’s a smart guy. He gets it. But just letting your body do the work and not your mind, that’s what football is about.”

Reference:  Bennett has 'heart-to-heart' with Onobun.

Mark Sanchez

This has all the markings of the people above him - Head Coach Rex Ryan and General Manager John Idzik.  But Mark Sanchez takes the high road, and avoids doing what scores of media and fans did:  which was to throw Ryan, at least, under the bus for his coaching miscalculation.

Rex Ryan has been heavily criticized for playing quarterback Mark Sanchez in the fourth quarter of Saturday's preseason game. But Sanchez himself, who was injured during the game, said Monday that he had no problem with the move. 

"I'm not here to second-guess the coaches," Sanchez said. "If they call you to play, you better be ready to play, and I was. So I went in and played and tried to win."

He added: "Look, I'm a competitor. And as a player, it's not my job to worry about when you're going in, who's in, what string, this or that. If they call your number, you've got to play and that's what I do, that's what I've always done. That's not my call. That's the coach's decision."

Sanchez said his shoulder was "a little sore" but improving. He added that his goal remains to be ready to play Week 1.

"That's in all of our plans," Sanchez said. "I'm trying to get back as soon as possible and be ready to practice as soon as possible."

Reference:  Sanchez:  'not here to second-guess'.

Tebow, Bennett and Sanchez are among the reasons why I love football.  Sports, in general.

Thank you for reading, and let me know what you think!

Ron Villejo, PhD