Tim Tebow was one of the biggest stories in baseball last season as he took positive strides in the New York Mets minor league system. That’s no longer the case.
Tebow rising: He got his career started with a bang.
- Tebow hit a home run on his very first professional at-bat.
- He also made headlines on a regular basis due to some impressive attendance numbers — the Tebow effect was very real.
There was plenty of talk before the 2019 season (much of it coming out of the Mets organization) that Tebow might just make the MLB club.
The wheels have come off the hype train: Fast forward to this season, and the buzz surrounding Tebow has died down significantly — for good reason.
Tebow hasn’t been able to continue developing in a positive manner playing for the Triple-A Syracuse Mets. His stats are downright repugnant:
- Tebow has just 10 hits in 77 at-bats this year.
- Tebow has struck out 32 times — nearly half of the time he’s been up to bat.
- Tebow has a .362 OPS and .193 OBP — staggeringly atrocious, both.
- Tebow has just three extra-base hits — all of them doubles.
- Tebow has just eight RBI.
No matter how you slice it, Tebow has been an abject failure at the Triple-A level.
Not moving the needle: Due to his ineffective play at the plate, Tebow isn’t generating any positive attendance numbers for Syracuse.
- Syracuse ranks 12th out of 15 teams in International League attendance: Just 3,808 people are showing up on a per-game average.
Poor play plus poor attendance numbers is a brutal combination. Tebow is beloved by many, yet he isn’t compelling his fans to come watch any more.
Granted, some of that may be due to the poor weather conditions that have plagued the Northeast much of the spring. There’s a chance Tebow would be much more influential in the south, where he has more fan support and the weather has been more cooperative.
The bottom line: One cannot objectively look at the evidence and say Tebow has been a success this season.
The Mets must admit the Tebow experiment has been a failure. It’s time to move on. He just isn’t good enough to play at the highest level. And that’s a fact.