According to ESPN senior writer Dave Fleming, Tebow's camp believes the 2010 first-round pick out of Florida is done in the NFL. From ESPN the Magazine's June 10 "Taboo" issue:
"Even now, after Tebow cleared waivers unclaimed and with members of his camp privately admitting that his NFL run is probably over, the football world remains as divided as ever over him."
It is true that, much to the chagrin of Chuck Norris, Tebow has not generated any interest from the NFL over the last month, but Ian Rapoport of the NFL Network counters that Tebow "is not giving it up", a reliable report which Mike Garafolo of The USA Today has seconded.
"When the Broncos defense was on the field, offensive coaches would often tell Tebow the first series of plays they wanted to run when the team got the ball back. Tebow would nod, and they'd separate. And then, invariably, a short while later he'd ask for the information again. Sometimes this ritual would repeat right up until Tebow had to duck into the huddle and call the play. As a result, despite starting only 11 games in 2011, Tebow was flagged for delay of game an NFL-high seven times. Worse still was the fact that, according to scouts, Tebow almost never audibled because he struggled to quickly and properly read defenses. And of all the deadly sins Tebow committed against quarterbacking, this was the worst: lacking the self-awareness to recognize and fix these shortcomings. Maybe the most shocking part of Tebowmania isn't that he has been cast out of the NFL after just three years but that he lasted as long as he did."
Add in Tebow's continually poor throwing mechanics, which has resulted in a career completion percentage of 47.9 percent, and it's clear that his days as a starting quarterback in the NFL are likely over.
While Tebow may not be an NFL-caliber starting quarterback, he's certainly an NFL-caliber athlete. That's why is it somewhat of a surprise that Tebow can't find a spot with one of the 30 other NFL teams in the league who had 2,700 roster spots to fill this offseason. The list of possible teams for Tebow is whittled down by the eight teams who have new head coaches that would prefer to not invite the circus that accompanies Tebow to town while trying to implement their systems. Still, that leaves nearly 2,000 spots for Tebow, who remains unemployed.
It might take an injury during the preseason or training camp, Tebow accepting a move to a new position, or perhaps Tebow heading to the CFL for a year or two, but it's doubtful we've seen the last of Tebow in the NFL. The 25-year-old has too much left in his tank to hang up his cleats.