TEBOW TOWN GIANT IMPACT
Champs take some Super jabs at Timsanity
PALM BEACH, Fla. — The Giants are the New York football team that wins Super Bowls and the Jets are the New York football team that wins the offseason. Only one of them comes with a trophy and a ring, yet the Jets’ trade for Tim Tebow guaranteed them another coveted offseason championship, so much so that he’s even on the brain of the reigning Super Bowl champs.
Yes, Tebowmania has found its way to the championship side of town, all the way into the owners’ box.
“My feelings are that I may attend a Jets game,” Giants co-owner Steve Tisch was saying y g Sunday y as he walked through the lobby at the NFL owners meetings. This should be the Giants’ moment to bask in another title, but it’s the Jets who have been dominating the headlines.
Eli Manning may be a two-time Super Bowl MVP, but does anybody really care what Broadway show he might take in? When Tebow checked out “Wicked” on Saturday night, the first Tebow sighting around Manhattan since he arrived in New Jersey on Thursday, the cameras were clicking and the fans a-tweeting.
The Giants are amused by the breathless reports about Tebowmania, which includes a news conference Monday for the Jets’ new backup quarterback in Jersey but they’re paying attention. So is the NFL. So are potential PSL customers.
That’s what the Jets want, of course. Despite Woody Johnson, Mike Tannenbaum and Rex Ryan insisting g Tebow was brought g in for football purposes only, they need him to remove theh the stench off of last season, transform the locker room from dysfunctional to functional and get them their own trophy and ring set.
Is that a lot to ask? Hey, he’s Tebow.
His inability to throw the ball might even get Santonio Holmes to like Mark Sanchez again, which would surely make it all worthwhile. The Giants are not flinching, but they also took some not
so-subtle jabs at their crosstown rivals. Giants co-owner John Mara was asked if New York is big enough for the Giants and Tebow. “I don’t know,” he said. “But the David Carr press conference will be tomorrow afternoon, too.”
Carr is back for another season as Manning’s backup. Last season, he didn’t throw a pass. Ryan’s reaction to Mara taking a shot at the unique idea of ho holding a news conference for a b back backup quarterback? “When you win a Supe Super Bowl, you can say anything you w want because they are the worl world champions,” he said. “That’s all fine an and dandy. To the young man, he’s h not n going out there trying to get t the at attention. The attention follows him.”
Maybe Tebow w will h help the Jets start to fight back against the Giants. Last year, Ryan R claimed the Jets were the “big bro brother” in the Giants-jets relationship. “Clearly, the statement w wasn’t very good,” Ryan said. “We’re looking up to them as is every other team in the NFL right now. They accomplished what I wanted to, being the best team in New York, being the best team in the NFL. The Giants accomplished that last year. We’ll take a swing at them.”
The last time the Giants won the Super Bowl, the Jets traded for Brett Favre, one of the all-time greats. It was working until Favre blew out his arm. The Tebow move makes little football sense but it makes a whole lot of marketing sense. He’s the most popular player in the NFL, even though he has limited quarterback skills. He may be more helpful selling jerseys than he is winning games.
I asked Tisch if he thought signing Tebow was an attempt by the Jets to steal attention from the Giants.
“Well, they are getting a lot of attention, so if that was one of their goals, I think they have been successful,” he said.
A marketing ploy for the Jets to gain traction in the marketplace? “I can’t answer that,” Mara said. “I don’t know. The guy is a good football player and brings a lot to the table. So I can’t say that. You have to ask them.”
This was a Jets town going into the 2011 season. They were coming off back-to-back appearances in the A FC Championship Game while the Giants missed the playoffs two years in a row. Ryan angered Giants players last year by claiming the Jets were the better team and it would stay that way for 10 years. He was off by quite a bit. When the Giants beat the Jets in the crucial Christmas Eve game that set the Giants up to win the NFC East and helped eliminate the Jets, the order of the sibling rivalry was restored. And when the Giants turned a 9-7 season into their fourth Super Bowl title, it made Ryan’s bragging seem incredibly foolish, even to himself.
He insisted Sunday that even if the Jets had won the Super Bowl, they still would have traded for Tebow. That’s hard to imagine. But with the Giants winning another Super Bowl, the Jets needed to take some drastic steps. They found one.
“My highest compliment to the Giants. They pulled it off,” Johnson said. “I’m proud to share a building I with them.” thought this was supposed to be Jets Stadium. Now Johnson is happy for the Jets to be known as the team that shares a stadium with the Super Bowl champs. It looks like the Jets are Tebowing right in front of the Giants’ Super Bowl trophy. Tim Tebow (far l.) has stirred things up in New York so much that Jets owner Woody Johnson (c.) and Giants co-owners John Mara and Steve Tisch (r.) have plenty to say on the new Jet backup quarterback.