Tebow day to day
He’s not much of a hitter yet, but in marketing, he’s already an All-Star
That’s his attitude as a popular St. Lucie Met.
PORT ST. LUCIE— They opened the ice cream stand for the first time on aTuesday this season, hoping to sell all 245 mini-helmets of ice cream on hand, and put extra cases of beer on portable hand-carts, ready to fortify the first stand in trouble. But the biggest example that TimTebow had arrived, that the St. LucieMets marketing staff’s prayerswere answered, were the tables stackedwith orange and blue (or blue and orange) No. 15TebowT-shirts going for $28 in adult sizes.
They already sold nearly 100 online in the day sinceTebowwas promoted to the Single-AMets froma lower Single-Ateam in Columbia, S.C. And now, here, with an unheard-of, few-hundred peoplewaiting an hour before the scheduled first pitch for the gates to open at FirstData Field?
“We don’t really knowwhat to expect,” said Richard Dodd, theMets’ assistant manager manning theT-shirt stand.
This, of course, iswhat this is all about. It was “BingoNightTuesday,” for the minorleagueMets, but that paled next toTebow Tuesday. Even when severe rain canceled the game, the crowd had fun with it.
“This is to see if he canwalk onwater,” one said.
Tebow, you see, is a minor-league marketing dream. He’s just not much of aminor-league prospect. He’s 29. He hit .220 at
Columbia (better than just 10 players in the Southern League) with 69 strikeouts in 64 games. He also had seven errors in left field.
“I’ve got a longway to go,” Tebow said, “but I’ve come aways, too.”
Sure, it’s easy and snarky to mock Tebow’s promotion to Port St. Lucie, as well as his full baseball chapter. Butwhy? It’s his life. His decision. And the fact he was promoted despite such leaky numbers? Whocares? Itwas froma lower Single-Ateam to a higher Single-Ateam.
It’s valid to ask what he expects to accomplish here beyond a summer in the sun. But maybe the accomplishment is just following some small-percentage dream.
Michael Jordan did this at the height of his basketball powers andwas roundly saluted for taking a chance. Tebow does it when his football career is over and he draws odd looks.
Tebow chuckled that he sometimes feels old amid his teammates, most of whomare in their low-20s. “They’ll ask meabout playing [football] with so-andso, and I’ll say, ‘Hey, I’m not grandpa,’ ” he said.
Still, he has mapped no big-plan scheme for baseball. Which is a good thing considering his numbers.
“It’s a scary place to get caught up in, the ‘where’s this going to lead,’ ‘what’s going to happen tomy future,’ ‘what is the next day,’ ” Tebow said a few hours before Tuesday’s gamewas rained out. “I get today. Tomorrow’s not promised. I’m going to make the most of today.
“Yeah, that sounds cliché, but gosh, I hope when you look atmy life 10, 20, 30 years from now, you can see somebody that they say really took advantage of that.”
Yes, he said, “Gosh.” He’s still that guy. And his priorities remain impeccable. He mentioned visiting with, “cancer patients in the last 24 hours— these opportunities are more important than anything I do [in baseball]. That’s something special.”
“I couldn’t care less if he hits the ball or not, if he can play baseball at all or not,” said Carol Cartinella, a retiree from Port St. Lucie in a Florida Gator T-shirt who stood in line for the gates to open.
“We’re supporting Tim Tebow, the man, not the player,” her husband, John said.
An impact player? You decide. At the Tebow T-shirt table, Caroline Lowenstein, 15, bought three for $89.27— one for her, her sister and her father.
“We’re visiting from Atlanta, andmy grandpa said Tebow was playing his first game here,” she said.“We used towatch him play football at Florida. We had to come out.”
Columbia’s attendance was up 40 percent with him this year. The St. Lucie Mets typically have no advance sales for games. They had nearly 500 advance tickets sold for Tuesday.
Baseball? That’s why Tebow is here. But the scouting report is clear on him right now: No hit, all marketing.