Mets President Announces Decision About Tim Tebow's Baseball Future
Despite two years of disappointment, Tim Tebow’s dream of playing major league baseball for the New York Mets has not yet struck out.
Tebow’s 2019 season was cut short by a hand injury, his second in two years. COVID-related restrictions wiped out the 2020 minor league season.
But Mets President Sandy Alderson said he wants Tebow to stay with the organization next year, and the former Heisman Trophy winner agreed, according to the New York Post.
“So I talked to Tim Saturday, in between Florida football and some other SEC [broadcasting] obligations,” Alderson said on Monday.
“He’s anxious to come back. And I told Tim, ‘Look, why would you want to end your quest based on a COVID-related reason? You didn’t get a chance to perform this year.’ He was hurt a little bit the previous year. So I think Tim is committed to coming back. And I think we’re committed to giving him an opportunity to do that and we’ll see where it goes.”
Alderson said Tebow deserves the chance to see how far he can go.
“This is not a quest without end. At some point it will culminate. But I think that will be at a time when Tim and the organization come to some agreement about where he is and what his potential is. But I didn’t want him to go out based on some COVID-related interruption,” he said.
Alderson was the team’s general manager when the Mets signed Tebow in 2016. Tebow struggled in 2017, but in 2018 was named an Eastern League All-Star while playing for the Mets’ AA team in Binghamton. He was promoted to the AAA farm team in Syracuse the next year, where he hit for an average of .163.
Tebow, who at 33 knows he is battling long odds, wants to return, according to MLB.com.
“I’m already behind the 8-ball in age and time and experience in all of these things, so of course it makes it harder,” Tebow said. “But I think at the same time, I try to learn from every bit of it. And that’s all that we can do.”
“There have definitely been some setbacks with it from two years ago when I was having what I thought was my best season,” Tebow said, citing his All-Star season. “Definitely disappointing this year with COVID, but … I’m such a believer that in some areas of my life, every setback has been an opportunity for a setup for something different and unique that I have planned. All these have been pieces of setbacks, but I think I’ve also learned from them, adapted and grown.”
Playing pro baseball is “not something that I want to do forever … because there’s a lot of other things that are in my heart that I want to pursue. But it is something that is still in my heart today,” Tebow said.
Those “other things” include his philanthropic work and his gig as a college football analyst for ESPN and the SEC.
“There are a lot of things that I have weighed and am weighing [in my life],” Tebow said. “We’re trying to rescue as many trafficked survivors as possible.”
Tebow also publicly embraces his Christian faith.
Sometimes it seems easier to just give up on people, or to shut down emotionally ourselves. This is just fear talking.
God is bigger than our greatest fears.
— Tim Tebow (@TimTebow) November 22, 2020
You can choose to trust God, even when your present circumstances feel overwhelming or even hopeless.
— Tim Tebow (@TimTebow) November 14, 2020
“We’re trying to push a lot of things that I’m super passionate about that mean so much to me, and so there’s a balance of pursuing a sport that I love … versus also pursuing other passions in my life,” he said.
Alderson said right now, the Mets “have benefited” from having Tebow in their organization.
“I think that the organization has already benefited significantly from his involvement with the Mets and his pursuit of a baseball career,” Alderson said.
“I think the Mets have benefited, I think baseball has benefited. As I said, this is not something that will go on forever. At some point it will lose its cachet or the interest of fans. But I couldn’t be happier with the way Tim has conducted himself as not only a teammate but a representative of the Mets. So given all that, he’s entitled to another shot post-COVID. And I’m happy he’s coming back,” he said.
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