COLUMN

There is no other time of the year I look forward to more than the start of the college football season. The month of August moves along like long, sharp claws dragging slowly and deeply down my back, and the first kickoff in early September is like the claws finally detaching from my battered skin, leaving me tingly and alive.

However, the beginning of the following season brings with it a lot of baggage. This fall I will greatly anticipate the games and the pageantry, and utterly bemoan the excruciatingly excessive coverage of the top-ranked Florida Gators, and the object of the most insupportable hyperbole and mindless idol worship in modern sports history, Tim Tebow.

By this time, every sports fan west of Mars is aware of the Gators QB; he of 2007 Heisman Trophy fame and the subject of endless puff pieces that have grown this summer to include stories by ESPN.com’s Ivan Maisel and a Sports Illustrated piece diplomatically titled, “You Have to Like Tim Tebow.”

It is obvious the media likes, er, loves the home-schooled, touchdown-scoring, mission-preaching, Filipino child-circumcising, modern-day Messiah. But it is not true that you have to like Tim Tebow, because I and the vast majority of my sports-following friends cannot stand the guy.

I speak for so many people whose opinions of this overhyped athlete are never expressed in any area of the media. It’s as if sharing one bit of criticism over a guy ESPN dubbed as “The Chosen One,” while he was still in high school is akin to calling Kim Jong Il a stark, raving lunatic on North Korean airwaves.

Let me qualify that all the commentary I am about to share by saying none of my vitriol should be attributed to envy. I, like most of my Tebow-bashing buddies, can recognize and appreciate a quality athlete when I see one, and Tebow is certainly that. My problem rests almost exclusively with the public personality of Tim Tebow, both the media’s representation of him and the way he carries himself when the lights are on.

If you haven’t checked out the feature ESPN ran about Tebow — search “Tebow man of god” in a YouTube field search and watch the first video that comes up. It is the epitome of PR disguised as an in-depth feature from a reputable national network. It is complete with Hallmark music, wistful commentary and zero personal insight, except when Tebow showed us a glimpse of his own self-righteousness when he said, “I could be spending my spring break having fun like other college kids, but instead (yada yada yada, some cliched statement about Jesus, you get the point).”

That feature is just one of the remarkably nauseating media ass kissing that has permeated the sporting landscape to the point of inescapable ubiquity. I could write a whole separate column about Fox Sports announcer Thom Brennaman’s wet kiss to the one they call Superman during Florida’s 2008 BCS National Championship Game win over Oklahoma, but I only have so many words which to work with.

Unlike other athletes like Lance Armstrong, Tiger Woods or LeBron James whom I tire of simply because they receive too much attention, Tebow is truly aggravating. I knew I wasn’t going to care for him during his freshman season with the Gators, before ESPN and other drones in the media turned the Tebow love up to 11.

In several interviews, he just seemed squirrelly, awkward and as authentic as a $5 Rolex. As the exposure has increased, it has become painfully obvious that there may never have been an athlete so eager to grandstand or demonstrate his own holiness.

That now famous speech he gave at the press conference following Florida’s loss to Ole Miss last season, where he vowed that “You will never see a team work harder … You will never see anyone push their team harder …” may be enshrined on a plaque in Ben Hill Griffin Stadium, but I couldn’t help but cringe.

Every time I hear this bloated, corny, over-the-top homily, I can only think of all the insincere jerkwads I played sports with in high school who wanted to prove how good of a “leader” they were by ripping maudlin lines just like that. Speeches like that never motivated anyone when I was in high school, it just irritated the team and the guys wouldn’t take it seriously.

My guess is that Florida’s players didn’t take it that seriously either, but because they went on to win the national championship, that speech will forever be pointed to as the turning point that saved their season, even though the Gators were immensely more talented than every other team they played that season.

And nobody seems to remember that he stormed off the field after that loss, refusing to shake the hand of any player from Ole Miss. There’s nothing wrong with being temporarily bitter about losing a game you love, but if you’re going to hold yourself up as some pillar of virtue, at least have the decency to show a little sportsmanship when things don’t go your way.

Incidents like his Ole Miss speech and the rotating Bible verses that he displays prominently on his eye black every game illustrate his pomposity and indicate that he is not nearly the humble and centered role model he is made out to be.