Seeing Tebow and his Broncos beat the Pittsburgh Steelers is seeing miracle upset #1. Will there be a #2? How do hard-lined football media pros talk about upsets like this? I mean, yeah, you could look at it like a statistical thing and say any given Sunday any team can win against any other team. But that seems like paltry complement that fails to describe Tebow’s Broncos, who now have one more playoff win than Matt Ryan’s Falcons, and the dirty birds are definitely a “better” team, at least on paper. I mean it’s the sort of thing you could say but it doesn’t really mean anything.
And even with a gimpy Big Ben, the Steelers are better than both of those teams. Of course the Steelers is far from invincible compared to even their 2010 season, so you have to ask what is going on here.
I think I like this whole Tebow winning games thing precisely because it makes people uncomfortable trying to describe what Tebow’s Broncos have done. How exactly do you talk about predicting an upset? Look at their far inferior team statistics? How do teams get it done when they have little statistical advantages? What is in the game plan? How will Tebow eventually crash and burn? Or not?
Coming into this next playoff game against New England, who is more or less still the same Brady offense monster as they were in recent years, will we see a repeat? New England is definitely also a team that has lost some of its sheen compared to 2010, although obviously Brady is much better off than Ben physically, and the Pats are less beat up than the Steelers as a group. This is such grand stage for such beautiful drama. And in that sense I’m going to root for Tebow all the way, because these upsets make for awesome entertainment. Certainly way better than if the game went the other way. I’m sure CBS execs are doing exactly the same thing.