Jacksonville: Tim Tebow Didn’t Want To Come Here

Jacksonville, Fl. – Jacksonville Jaguars owner Shahid Khan said the team had tried their hardest to trade for quarterback Tim Tebow from Denver, but in the end Tebow didn’t want to go to Florida.

The Florida Times-Union interviewed Khan this week and the Jaguars owner said the team was willing to sacrifice a third round pick and eat $3 million dollars to land Tebow’s services.

Khan told reporters at the NFL:’s annual meetings,

“That would have been the worst thing for Jacksonville and the worst thing for him. He didn’t want to come, obviously. … Any one of the 53 players we have, have to be committed to Jacksonville, making us be the best team we are. The question was: Did he want to come? And if the decision had been taken out (of his hands) and we got him, that would not be good for him, or for us.”

Tebow originally said the decision was out of his hands. He said,

“Ultimately, I really didn’t have any[Choice] because the Broncos had all that power. I was just kind of watching and waiting—kind of like everybody else. It was an interesting day.”

Broncos vice president John Elway said he did have a choice saying,

“We did. There was more (offered) from Jacksonville, but we looked at it and it was close enough and we were in contact with Tim throughout the day and talked to him. He knew what was going on the whole time, so the reports that he was not involved are not accurate,”

Jaguars coach Mike Mularkey said the team did a lot to try to get Tebow to come to Jacksonville, He said,

“Don’t believe everything you hear or read in the media. It’s hard not to want a guy like that. We wouldn’t have tried to trade for him if we didn’t feel like we didn’t want to have him here. There were a lot of things that went into this thing to try to get Tim to come here. In the long run, it did not work out. But if you do not want a player, you don’t even get involved.”

The Jaguars and Jets were the top two choices for Tebow. In the end he told people that in New York he had a better chance to start. Jacksonville told him they had no promises for where he would wind up on their roster.

Khan said,

“We were not going to say coming in, ‘He’s slotted at whatever’. We have two quarterbacks now (Blaine Gabbert and Chad Henne) that we’re committed to. He would have to compete with them.”