NFL MONTANA STATES
Says Sanchez is better than Tebow ‘and that’s it’
MARK SANCHEZ is entering unfamiliar and dangerous territory: The dreaded quarterback controversy. He brought it on himself. If he played better last season, Tim would be Tebowing somewhere else.
Basically, the Jets have put Sanchez is an impossible situation by bringing in the NFL’S jersey-selling machine. Tebow will start off in the Wildcat but he didn’t come here to watch Sanchez play. He wants his job.
Joe Montana, who had to fight off Steve Young in San Francisco in a bitter QB controversy between two future Hall of Famers, says it’s not difficult to operate in that kind of climate. Montana won two Super Bowls before Young arrived in 1987 and two more with Young pressuring him from behind.
By the time Young showed up, Montana was already Joe Cool. He was mentally tough. Sanchez is fragile.
But Montana endorsed Sanchez as the Jets’ starting quarterback.
“Mark is a better player right now and that’s it,” he said in an email to the Daily News. “As long as Mark believes in himself and plays, it’s not an issue. It’s more of an issue for those of you who write, or blog or tweet and all the other methods of delivering content.”
There is a way for Tebow’s arrival to work to Sanchez’s advantage. His teammates could feel he’s been wronged by the Jets brinigng in a novelty quarterback who can’t throw, and in a strange way, it could prompt them to rally around Sanchez. He ended the season with dwindling support in the locker room and in a nasty battle with wide receiver Santonio Holmes. But if Holmes was unhappy with Sanchez’s inibility to get him the ball, then the receiver’s January meltdown will make him look like a team leader compared to how he will act the first time Tebow drills a ball into the g round 10 yards in front of him.
Sanchez can keep Tebow stuck on the bench and solidify his place as the Jets’ No. 1 quarterback by following The Six Easy Steps To Surviving An Already Explosive Quarterback Controversy.
Here’s all Sanchez has to do this season to put an end to Timsanity: Sabotage Tebow by secretly videotaping the contents of his Wildcat playbook and send it to you-know-who i Foxborough. T hrow for 30 touchdowns and five interceptions.
Lead the Jets to a 12-4 record, finish ahead of the hated Patriots, win the AFC East title and get a first-round playoff bye. Volunteer to work part-time in the ticket department to help sell Woody Johnson’s remaining PSLS. Devise a signature touchdown celebration that will introduce Sanchizing and make Tebowing obsolete. n Win the Super Bowl. Here’s another way of saying it: Sanchez has got some problems.
The Jets sure have a strange way of showing Sanchez how much they love him. They chased after Peyton Manning — they had to give it a shot — but didn’t even make the cut as one of the five teams he granted an audience. As soon they knew Manning wanted no part of the circus, they finalized a contract extension they had been working on for Sanchez.
Sanchez recovered from the Manning threat just in time to get blindsided by Timsanity. The Jets did Sanchez a disservice by not providing legitimate competition for him his first three years. Kellen Clemens and Mark Brunell? Seriously.
And if they signed Kyle Orton or Jason Campbell to challenge him this summer it would have made sense without causing much noise. But Tebow is the last quarterback the Jets should have acquired if they still think Sanchez is their future. It’s foolish and counterproductive to subject him to Tebow’s cult following, the fans that have watched Tebow from his days as a college football hero to the big stage of the NFL, where he wins games in unconventional but somehow appealing ways while being a polarizing figure, because of how big a part religion plays in his life.
The Jets have enabled and babied Sanchez, and some big shots in the organization believe he’s still immature, which is a damning thing to say about a 25-year-old quarterback going into his fourth year. But sticking Tebow on him? What were they thinking?
As soon as Sanchez throws his first pick, the chants for Tebow are going to rattle around Sanchez’s helmet. He must let them go in one earhole and out the other. Those chants would not have happened had Orton been the backup, or Campbell or Drew Stanton, who sure did have a memorable oneweek career with the Jets.
The crowds around Tebow at training camp in Cortland will be so big that, by comparison, Sanchez will look like the backup punter. Backup QBS are always the most popular players on the team, but in this case, the Jets backup is the most popular player in the league.
The Jets are going to be the only team in the NFL that will have to bring two quarterbacks into the interview room after every game. Maybe they can bring them in together and Sanchez can answer questions about the interceptions he throws in the conventional offense, and Tebow can talk about the passes he floats for pick-sixes in the Wildcat.
Quarterback controversies have been going on forever. The great Tom Landry once alternated Roger Staubach and Craig Morton every play in a loss in Chicago in 1971. He settled on Staubach after the game and went on to win the Super Bowl. Phil Simms vs. Jeff Hostetler in 1991 was divisive. Montana vs. Young set the standard for venom. Montana despised Young. Young was publicly deferential to Joe Cool but he also had a burning desire to play that was not easy to hide. “It was competitive,” Montana told me a couple of years ago. “It was just that he wanted what I had and I wa nted to keep it.”
Te bow wants what Sanchez has and Sanchez wants to keep it. Hall of Famers Joe Montana and Steve Young squabbled in contentious QB battle in San Francisco, something Mark Sanchez and Tim Tebow will soon understand.