Through My Eyes (13 page)

He was right, and I did love baseball. Turning and connecting on an inside fastball is a great feeling.

But football was my
passion
. More specifically, playing football as a throwing quarterback has always been my passion, and I was not going to let baseball get in the way of my making a timely decision.

My relationship with my top two head coaches was good. No, great. Both men were first-class football coaches as well as men of character, integrity, and caring. At Florida, I knew I probably wouldn’t be able to beat out the senior, Chris Leak, at quarterback as a freshman and therefore didn’t know if I’d play at all during that first year. At Alabama, I might have had the chance to compete with John Parker Wilson to start that first year, but I didn’t know for sure. It didn’t really matter—I wanted to play for either one of those coaches, whether I got on the field that first season or not. And for those who think that coaches should be able to leave a particular school without repercussions but the athletes should be bound to the school, all I can offer is my own personal experience in the whole recruiting process: the identity of the coach was critical in making my decision.

Decision Day rolled around, and I still didn’t know what I was going to do. Earlier in the day, I had already called Coach Miles at LSU, Coach Carr at Michigan, and Coach Carroll at USC. I told them I appreciated their time and interest but that I wouldn’t be coming to their school that next year. It was down to the final two. I had been praying about it regularly, and my family was praying as well. I had no doubt that the Lord was leading throughout this whole process, but what was unclear was determining
where
He was leading.

People often seem to think that when you’re following the Lord and trying to do His will, your path will always be clear, the decisions smooth and easy, and life will be lived happily ever after and all that. Sometimes that may be true, but I’ve found that more often, it’s not. The muddled decisions still seem muddled, bad things still happen to believers, and great things can happen to nonbelievers. When it comes to making our decisions, the key that God is concerned with is that we are trusting and seeking Him. God’s desire is for us to align our lives with His Word and His will.

But that’s part of faith, what the writer of the book of Hebrews describes as a belief in things that we cannot see. Still, it would have helped if He had yelled down from the heavens the direction He wanted me to take or had just written the answer with His fingertip in the clouds—I certainly would have been listening and watching.

Unfortunately, I wasn’t feeling any of that direction as the time approached. No guidance, even though I knew I was being guided, and no peace, even though I knew He was there, offering it to me. Postponing my decision wasn’t going to help. I wasn’t going to grow further apart from either Coach Meyer or Coach Shula in the next two months, but rather and most likely the opposite would occur. If anything, the decision would grow even harder.

Therefore, on Tuesday, December 13, 2005, just three days after we had beaten Armwood High School to win the state 4A title, I stood behind the stage with my parents and family. No one could help me decide—my family understood my dilemma. I am sensitive to the way others feel and didn’t want to tell either of these two coaches no. More important, I actually wanted to play for both of them.

We had just filmed the presentation of the Florida Dairy Farmers High School Player of the Year in the school auditorium and took a break before they were to film my college decision. The crowd and cameras were ready. We were not.

Thirty minutes until show time. Still no idea. I was overcome with emotion and trying, unsuccessfully, not to cry behind the stage. It had been a long, arduous, and, at times, emotional journey. I wanted to make the right decision.

Twenty minutes. I owed them answers.

I gulped and picked one.

“I’m going to Florida,” I told my dad. “I’m going to call Mike Shula first and let him know.”

I called Coach Shula. As I told him I was going to Florida, my tears turned into sobs. I doubt he could make out anything I was trying to say, but he was getting the point. He cut me off.

“Tim,” he began, “I love you as a person and a player. When I told you that you were going to have a great career and life of meaning, I meant that. I wanted it to be here, but it’s still true. I still love you, and you’re still going to do great things, even if it’s not at Alabama.”

I have no idea what I said to him after that, but we hung up and I turned to my family.

“That’s the coach I want to play for—Coach Shula’s so great. Maybe I should call him back and change my answer.” First, though, we decided, I should speak to Coach Meyer and see how that left me feeling.

“Coach, it’s Timmy. ” He laughed nervously, as if he didn’t know who was calling. He told me he’d been driving around much of the day to stay busy while waiting for my call. In fact, he had been trying to stay busy all day, but every turn brought him back to my decision, he said. He had gone for a jog that morning and passed several runners who called out, “Hope you get Tebow!” Then, at the office, Jeremy Foley, the athletic director at Florida, stuck his head in.

“Any word from Tim Tebow?”

Of course there was no news to speak of. He’d then headed out into the stands at Florida Field, where he sat on the forty-fifth row. Forty-five was his lucky number, and since he couldn’t think of anything else to do . . .

Finally, as he was stuck in traffic, I called.

“Coach,” I continued, “I’ve been thinking about it, and . . . Coach? Are you there? Coach?” He wasn’t. Dead silence on the other end of the line. I later learned that his phone had died after he’d been driving around and using it all day and that he didn’t have his car charger with him. As intense as he is, I knew he wasn’t taking this development of a dropped call from me very well. He could tell that I had been crying and he wasn’t sure how to interpret that.

Now I had no idea what to do. I was thinking,
Do I stick with Florida since that had been my final and maybe knee-jerk reaction, or do I switch to Alabama based on the always-classy Coach Shula? But if I do that, shouldn’t I tell Coach Meyer first that I’m not going to come to Florida?
I couldn’t get through on his phone and didn’t know why.

I took the podium and quieted myself and focused. Earlier in the day, I had typed my prepared statement with a long list of thank yous. I concluded my statement with “Next year, I will be playing football at the University of ________.” I had left it blank, trying to decide.

Ninety miles away from that podium over in Gainesville, Shelley Meyer called her husband in from outside. She had the television on. Coach Meyer had driven home and was playing catch with their son, Nate, nervously passing the few remaining minutes until the announcement.

ESPN had me miked up before we went on the air, and I could see the cameraman’s look of amazement as I turned to my family members, trying to decide at the last minute where to go. Coach Meyer’s passion flashed into my mind.

“I will be playing college football next year at the University of Florida.” There, it was done, and the peace that I had been waiting for throughout this whole process was still nowhere to be found. But at least the decision had been made.

Unfortunately, it wouldn’t turn out to be the last time I cried over a Florida–Alabama outcome.