You’ve witnessed the miracle comebacks. You’ve heard the stories about his gladiator strength and unmatched work eithic. You’ve definitely tweeted about him, right? Well if you haven’t, you’re the only one. Of course I’m talking about Tim Tebow, the quarterback in Denver that has led his team on a story-like run into the playoffs.
Last Sunday, while Tebow was busy throwing an 80 yard touchdown pass to teammate Demaryius Thomas to seal an overtime win over the Pittsburg Steelers, everyone else was tweeting about him. According to Twitter, the popular QB was mentioned in 9,420 tweets per second. PER SECOND! That set a record for sports tweets, kicking the Women’s World Cup Final out of their top spot with 7,196/second, and moving past Hollywood status when Beyonce’s baby bump annoucement reached 8,800 tweets/second in August of 2011.
So let’s recap…the highly religious, squeeky clean, All-American boy with a weird throwing motion is creating more Twitter maddess than pop culture royalty’s offspring? Crazy?
Well, not really, if we think about it. Tebow, who has a number of top level endorsements (Nike, FRS, Jockey), is playing the most high-profile position for a legendary franchise in the country’s most popular sport.
The Broncos-Steelers game was watched by 42.4 million people, making it the most watched game of the NFL season, the most watched Wild Card game ever, and the most watched television program since last year’s Super Bowl. Pretty impressive. So much so that Tim Tebow, at age 24 and in just his second year in the NFL, has been named America’s Favorite Professional Athlete by ESPN Sports Poll.
And this is just the beginning. The Broncos and the Patroits will face off this weekend at Gilette Stadium, in the second round of the NFL playoffs. Brady vs Tebow, should be fun. Get your 140 characters ready!


