Tim Tebow: Why the Denver Broncos Need to Give Him a Chance over Kyle Orton

There seems to be fewer and fewer of us these days, but I'm a fan of what Kyle Orton brings to a team at the quarterback position.

He is steady, calm and never goes out of his way to throw teammates under the bus for dropped passes and fumbles. That sounds simple, but nothing alienates teammates like a quarterback that throws up his hands in disgust at every mistake.

Orton is also an underrated athlete. He doesn't have the arm of a Jay Cutler or a Brett Favre in his prime, but he has plenty of arm to make all the throws he needs to make. He's often called a "game manager," which is a curse word when talking about quarterbacks, but I've always felt he is more than that.

Even as an admitted fan of Orton's, I can't help but feel that it's time for the Broncos to go ahead and turn over the offense to Tim Tebow.

First of all, it can't really hurt. The Broncos finished 4-12 last season and they've done nothing to make you think they are going to be a whole lot better this season. Last season, they lost 12 games, most of them with Orton at quarterback. It would be hard for Tebow to do much worse.

If I were a Broncos fan, I wouldn't care what the team did differently so long as they did, in fact, do something different.

Making Tebow the starter certainly would be different. He would give the Broncos offense a new look. He isn't nearly as accurate as he will need to be, but he has plenty of arm to make most of the throws he needs to make and he made a career out of throwing on the run at Florida.

Having Orton hang around with Tebow as the starter might seem like a hindrance, but I see it the other way. Having Orton on the roster while Tebow starts is a good insurance policy.

I'd much rather Tebow have his growing pains with a solid backup like Kyle Orton waiting behind him and that can only happen this year.

Orton is a free agent at the end of the year and if he is unsure of his future in Denver right now, it's unlikely that he will want to re-sign given the likelihood that Tebow will be the starter in the long term.

If Brady Quinn were going to be around for more than just one year, I'd consider him a reasonable backup for Tebow in case he falters, but he is on the last year of his deal as well. He is another candidate to sign elsewhere looking for a chance to start.

The Broncos need to begin to find out what they have in their young quarterback while they have time to allow him to make mistakes.

The time for Tebow to shine is undoubtedly sometime in the future. The time for Tebow to start, however, is right now.