Tim Tebow playing baseball shows how much smarter he is than his haters

Tim Tebow Holding Workout For All 30 Major League Baseball Teams

By announcing his desire to play professional baseball, Tim Tebow showed once again how much smarter he is than all of his haters.

As you might expect when Tebow, the former Florida Gators Heisman Trophy winner and perpetual cultural icon, announced his intention to pursue a baseball career, his critics came out of their dark, dank spider holes.

The Tebow baseball story overshadowed even the Olympics on Tuesday with the blaring headline above a column written by ESPN.com baseball writer Jayson Stark: "Stark: Tebow in Majors? Not a chance."

I won"t bore you with the barrage of criticism Tebow received except to reprint a comment made by ESPN loudmouth Screamin" A. Smith, who went on a typically obnoxious diatribe against Tebow Tuesday with comments like this: "Look I"ve said this on many occasionsI"m trying to be nice!I truly am trying to be nice, but the arrogance! If I am a baseball player do you know how insulted I am that Tim Tebow"s about to have a workout and everybody and their grandmother"s planning on showing up to see Tim Tebow!?"

And that"s exactly the point. Everybody"s going to show up to see Tebow"s tryout. And everybody"s going to talk about it. And everybody"s going to read about it. And Buster Olney and Jason Stark are going to write about it. And Pedro Gomez will be following him around during spring training. And some wayward team is going to sign him because he can sell tickets and jerseys. And Tim Tebow will once again become the biggest story in sports despite the fact that he is not an NFL- or MLB-quality player.

This is the utter brilliance of Tebow, his agents and his handlers. As popular and polarizing as he is, Tebow"s standing in the national sporting consciousness was beginning to wane simply because he is years removed from playing meaningful minutes in the NFL.

And, so, what better way to resurrect his relevance then to announce he is pursuing a baseball career? Suddenly, everybody is interested in Tebow once again.

Then there is this: If you"re Tebow and the world is yours for the taking, why wouldn"t you try to play baseball? Don"t ever forget playing sports is fun and any of us who had a chance to continue the pursuit of making a living while playing a kid"s game would certainly do it. Because of Tebow"s name and his fame, he is afforded that opportunity.

Good for him.

Colin Cowherd, the eloquent radio host on Fox Sports Radio, put it best on Tuesday. He pointed out that Tebow wasn"t giving up on his football dream and that, in fact, he had accomplished his dream. After all, despite Tebow"s limited passing ability, he won a Heisman, he became a first-round draft pick, he started in the NFL and even won a playoff game. Dream accomplished.

Now he has the opportunity to pursue another dream -- a seemingly impossible dream.

Or is it?

Even if he somehow, someway gets one Major League at-bat in a spring training game, wouldn"t we all consider that the memory of lifetime?

You go for it, Timmy.

Email me at mbianchi@tribune.com. Follow me onFacebook here andTwitter @BianchiWrites. And listen to my Open Mike radio show every Monday-Friday from 6-9 a.m. on FM 96.9 and AM 740.

Source: http://www.orlandosentinel.com/sports/open-mike/os-tim-tebow-baseball-espn-stephen-a-smith-20160809-story.html