Tim Tebow Called Out By ESPN Ombudsman, Compared To Stephen A. Smith
Tim Tebow isn’t in the NFL anymore, but that hasn’t stopped him from being the league’s biggest lightning rods for criticism.
That was the case again this week, when in the wake of the Stephen A. Smith controversy, ESPN ombudsman Robert Lipsyte couldn’t help getting in a shot at Tebow.
Smith had kicked up some controversy when he though the NFL’s punishment of Baltimore Ravens running back Ray Rice was too light. Rice had been arrested — but not charged — in a domestic violence incident with his then-fiance (who he has since married).
But in calling out Rice, Smith appeared to place blame on his fiance for the incident, saying, “Let’s make sure we don’t do anything to provoke wrong actions. If we come after somebody has put their hands on you, it doesn’t negate the fact that they already put their hands on you. So let’s try to make sure that we can do our part in making sure that that doesn’t happen.”
Lipsyte faulted Stephen A. Smith for his lackluster apology, which he compared unfavorably to Tim Tebow.
“[This] might be just as well; Smith’s attempts at coherency are often as exciting as Tim Tebow’s scrambling,” Lipsyte wrote.
Unprompted shots at Tim Tebow are nothing new. Earlier this year NFL referee Jim Daopoulus used Tebow as an example of inaccuracy when explaining a pass interference call.
“We as officials have always been taught, for a ball to be uncatchable, it has to be clearly out of the field of play or it has to be a kind of — I probably shouldn’t say this — a Tim Tebow-type pass that lands 15 yards in front of you,” he said.
But at least Tim Tebow has some defenders. This week his former college coach, Urban Meyer, said he believes Tebow should still have a place in on an NFL roster.
“I still don’t get that part of it,” Meyer said. “He’s the second-most efficient passer ever to play college football.”
Tim Tebow appears to be doing pretty well for himself, though. He took a job as an analyst at the new SEC Network, and recently bought a $1 million home near Jacksonville.
